Life After
by Dark Aegis
Summary: It's a sound she never thought she'd hear again, the sound of the universe. And a man she thought was dead is standing, alive, in front of her. PostDoomsday fic with Rose Tyler, the Ninth Doctor, and the Tenth Doctor
1. Chapter 1: Life After Death

**Title:** Life After  
**Authors:** Gillian Taylor  
**Rating:** PG-13  
**Characters:** Rose Tyler, Ninth Doctor, Tenth Doctor  
**Summary:** It's a sound she never thought she'd hear again, the sound of the universe. And a man she thought was dead is standing, alive, in front of her.  
**Spoilers:** Post-Doomsday  
**Disclaimer:** Don't own them. I just like playing with them...a lot.  
**Archive:** Sure, just let me know.

**A/N:** Thanks, as always, to my lovely betas NNWest & WMR. Also, I won't be posting as frequently as I used to do. Probably every other day, if not every three days.

* * *

**Life After  
by Gillian Taylor**

**Chapter 1: Life after Death**

Rose Tyler knows that there's life after death. The Beast told her that she'd die in battle. In some ways she has. She's no longer the Doctor's companion, no longer travelling through the universe, seeing the past and future of this and a dozen other worlds. She works now. Day in, day out. Same old pre-Doctor life, but different.

Torchwood has been good to her, really. She's a team leader now, going out and about, searching for alien technology and saving the world. She can't help but feel, though, that something's missing. Part of her knows that it's the Doctor, so she does her best to fill in for him.

Nestene Consciousness attacking London? Simple. Anti-plastic's the way to go. Silurian invasion? Bit more difficult, that, but she manages. All it takes is an explosion or two and it's sorted. She's earning a reputation, really. The go-to person for all things alien, and that's okay with her. Means she'll be the first – or so she hopes – to learn if her half-crazed-half-hopeful-half-dream is correct.

That he's returned for her.

She knows, however, that she can't live her life waiting. That's not what he'd want for her, nor is it what she wants for herself. Yet she lets a piece of her – admittedly a large piece – hold onto that hope as she continues to live her life.

This is life after death, really. Life after the fantasy is over. Life after him.

It's the small things that get to her now. Small things that jump out at her about how different this new universe is from her old. True, there's Pete, but that's not all. This London doesn't have beans on toast. She's had to invent that for herself, really, and call it a strange habit to those who ask.

The streets are different, too. Once she tried to see what the Powell Estates look like in this universe and she finds that they don't exist. In its stead stands a park commemorating some great battle that never happened in her universe. She knows that she has to stop of thinking of this as a new world and consider it hers, but she finds it hard. So, so hard.

Everything's changed and she knows it's because of her. She's the different one. Not just this new universe, but her. And it's mostly because of him. Once upon a time, and it seems so long ago now, she told Mickey and her Mum that he taught her how to live a better life, how to stand up, how to make a difference.

She's doing that, she knows. Making a difference, fighting the good fight. It's a good life, and she realises that. She just misses him.

Always will, she suspects. There'll always be a Doctor-shaped hole in her heart, but that's okay. She's a survivor now. Survived the last dredges of the Time War. She's fought Daleks, Slitheen, werewolves, Krillitane and Cybermen. Life after the Doctor should be simple in comparison, right?

Well, she's always been rather good at lying to herself.

Shaking herself out of her reverie, she considers the device that's brought all these considerations to the fore. It's another piece of alien technology that she suspects – hopes – manipulates the forces of a temporal rift. Something like, say, that which exists in Cardiff.

The alternate Cardiff is much the same as the one her proper universe. Same sights, same sounds, same smells. Even the same Rift. She thought it was strange that it exists here, too. There was no Gwyneth, no Doctor and no her in this universe to seal it before, but somehow there's a sort of echo. It's not as strong, she thinks, but it's enough for Torchwood to set up a satellite office.

This device fell out of the Rift and caused enough of an uproar for someone to send for her. So here she is. Considering it, twisting it to and fro, and wondering if it might be something that she can use to go back to where she belongs.

That, she thinks, is a stupid thought. She doesn't know what it does; she just has her suspicions. Even if she's right, how can she be certain that she'll be going back to her universe? Or even if the Doctor would want her to come back. He said goodbye, something that she knows he's never really done before. He's probably put her behind him, knowing that he can't come back for her and that she can't go back to him.

No. She can't think like that. Even if he doesn't want her back, she'd be in her proper place, her proper universe. That's something, right?

The device really reminds her of something straight out of a 'B' rated science fiction film. Something that Mickey would've dragged her to back in the day. Complete with cheap plastic-looking ends, blinking lights, and a big candy-like red button.

_Oh, a big red button that must never ever be pushed…_

The memory of his voice strikes her hard at that moment and she almost drops the device. God, she can be rather stupid sometimes. Dumb ape, that's her. Shaking her head, she moves to put it aside. Maybe she can run some scans on it, see if she can come up with something more solid than 'I think it does this…'

She's clever enough to realise that she can't just randomly hit buttons on alien devices. It could do anything, be anything. Destroy the world, it could, and she won't be the cause of that. She needs information.

"Tosh, can you run a scan?" she asks, directing her question to the Japanese woman beside her. "Is it giving off any sort of energy? Anything that might be useful in figuring out what it does?"

Tosh frowns, repositioning her glasses up her nose in an absent gesture. She's been a friend when she's needed one, and she's glad that Toshiko agreed to come with her to Cardiff. The branch here just didn't have anyone that she trusts as much with anything alien. "They did run a few scans before, Rose. They weren't able to find anything."

She smiles. "Ah, but they didn't have you running them."

Toshiko laughs and gestures for her to put the device back onto the table. "I'll bring the scanner over. Maybe we'll see something they didn't."

She nods, carefully setting the device on its side. It's at that moment that the Cardiff branch's pet pterodactyl decides to let out a screech, startling her enough that she nudges the device a little too hard, depressing the candy-like red button.

It begins to hum loudly, emitting a bright white light that all but blinds her.

Oh, god, what's she done? Her breathing quickens, her pulse races and she's ready to dive for cover.

And then she thinks she hears it, more like a dream than reality. It's a sound that she knows as well as she knows her own voice, his voice. It's the sound of the fabric of space-time being ripped apart. A sound that she never thought she'd hear again.

It's the sound of a TARDIS materialising.

* * *

"Oh no. No, no, no, no…" he mutters as he darts around the console, frantically flipping switches and turning knobs as he tries to alter their headlong course into what could only result in a particularly nasty crash. And he's never crashed the TARDIS, not even on purpose. Well, there was that attempt with the time-ram, but he prefers to ignore that bit. Always been a fantastic pilot, him.

Except, it seems, for this time. Something's got hold of his ship. Something's pulling them through what looks to be like some sort of spatio-temporal rift. And that something's got a lot of pull. He can't break it. Even reversing the polarity of the neutron flow – that tried and true favourite of his – doesn't work.

They're falling.

"Doctor?" Rose asks as she almost careers into him, knocked off balance by the rocking the TARDIS was currently receiving.

"Problem," he tells her succinctly, trying something else. Something has to work, right? He has to be able to keep them out of the… Oh, _Rassilon_, it's not... "Hold on!" he orders, gripping the sides of the console as the ship heaves beneath him.

The TARDIS is screaming in his mind, her exterior torn as she travels unprotected through what can only be the Void. Sparks fly from the console, stinging his hands as he holds on with all his might. He hears an explosion from somewhere, sees smoke rise from the grating and he can only continue holding on, hoping that it's not as bad as it seems. That it's not…

And then it stops. Just like that. A cocoon of silence encompasses them but for the silent pulsing of the time rotor. Makes him think that it might be over, really, as the rotor slows to a stop with the familiar grinding noise that signals a materialisation. He'll have to sort out the damage, of course, but they're in one piece. At least he is.

"Rose?" he asks, turning to find her gripping onto one of the support columns. "You all right?"

"Yeah, fine," she replies, searching his eyes for a moment. "You?"

"Bit jostled 's all," he says, turning his attention back to the viewscreen. If he can get the screen to work, he can figure out where they are. The TARDIS isn't too badly damaged, at least he doesn't think so. Should only take a day or two to get it sorted before they're back to doing what they do best.

"What happened?"

He's about to reply when the viewscreen flickers to life. The exterior view's a bit dark. Dingy, really, if he were to name it. There's a silver column blocking part of the view, but behind it he can see what looks like an old Tube tunnel. Well, maybe. Something of that type at least.

In the shadows, hidden by the bulk of the column, he sees activity. A person, no two people, are approaching the ship. As they come closer, he sees at least one of them is holding a gun while the other...

The other, he realises in shock, is Rose.

He moves to block the image from his Rose, studying the figure on the screen carefully. That Rose is a bit older, he suspects, mostly because of the way she holds herself. The suit's new. He can't really imagine seeing her in a suit, yet there it is. The very model of a business woman. But there's something else. Something that strikes him as off about her. No, he realises. Not about her but about here.

"Doctor?" He vaguely hears Rose ask, but he ignores the question in favour of his contemplations.

Time isn't running properly. Seems to be a bit…off. Frowning, he hits a few buttons. Oh. That'd explain it. Different universe. But...the Rose onscreen – and he really needs to figure out a proper way of distinguishing them – seems to know the TARDIS. He can see her mouthing the name as she comes even closer, tears in her eyes.

That's impossible. Bloody impossible because there are no other TARDISes. Not anywhere. No other Time Lords, just him. Which means even though this is a different universe, it's the same Rose.

Things have just got a lot more complicated.

"Doctor!" Rose, his Rose, says again and he feels her touch his arm. "What's going on?"

He turns to face her, still blocking the screen. "Bit difficult to explain, really," he begins and winces as her expression gains shades of Jackie Tyler. She looks like she's about to slap him. Right, enough of that. "Got caught up in a spatio-temporal vortex. Knocked us about a bit so we're stuck for the time being."

"Stuck as in…"

"Stuck. Not going anywhere. Can't dematerialise until she's fixed and all that," he replies, cutting her off.

"Then where are we?" she asks, seeming to catch some hidden concern in his voice. Bollocks. And here he's supposed to be able to hide things better from her. This isn't how a 900 (give or take several centuries) year old's supposed to behave.

"Ah. Yes. That's the problem. We're in a different universe," he says.

"A different universe?" she repeats.

"You going to keep repeating me?" His voice might be a little terse, but he supposes that he can be excused. Different universes should be impossible to get to without the Eye of Harmony, but somehow he's managed it. And, somehow, another Rose Tyler is standing outside those doors.

Another Rose Tyler who might just have a...

Oh. Oh, no.

He turns back to the screen and notices that the image of Rose is holding something that happens to look very much like a key. A TARDIS key. And he can hear something slip into the lock.

"Right. Rose, can you go to the library and get the TARDIS manual? Think it's somewhere near the back, by the fireplace," he says, hoping that he's managed to keep the desperation out of his voice. He can't let her see the other Rose. It'd be catastrophic. No, worse than that. Apocalyptic.

She blinks at him for a moment. "You-"

"Please?" he asks, willing her to listen just this once.

Though she frowns, she obediently turns and heads toward the door that leads to the TARDIS' interior. "I'll go, but I wanna know what's going on here when I get back, yeah?"

He nods. "I'll tell you," he promises, hoping that she'll hurry.

She does and it's just in time as the double doors open to reveal another woman identical in all ways but one to the one that's just left.

This Rose Tyler is crying.

"Oh, god, Doc-" She cuts herself off and stares at him, eyes wide. "You're… you can't… Oh, fuck."

He just blinks at her.

* * *

It's him. Oh, god, it's him. Not her last Doctor, but her first. Same big ears, same face, same leather jacket, same everything. She thought it was the one who lost her, not this one. Not when...

Oh. Oh, no. She must be here. A younger version of her from before everything went pear-shaped. And she can't see herself. It'd be like the aftermath of seeing her dad all over again and she has no desire to relive that.

"I…" she begins and stops again, steeling herself as best she can. "I don't remember this," she blurts out, feeling particularly stupid when he looks at her as if she's being daft.

"You wouldn't," he tells her. "Time's fluid. Things change. Time re-writes itself. You might remember it now or you might not. Depends, really, on jus' what happened. Was it you?"

There's a hardness in his voice that she doesn't remember hearing before, not directed at her. "Was it me, what? You didn't… Oh, hell. Of course you hadn't. 'Fraid it must be my – our – fault." She did this. She pulled him through the rift and changed history. Great. Fantastic.

The best, he'd called her once. Like hell she is.

"How?" he asks, the distance between them seeming infinite. She longs to rush to him, to hug him, to say goodbye as she never really had the chance to before. However, she holds herself still.

"There's this device that we found. It got jostled, a button got pressed, an' it started humming and emitting this bright light. By the time it faded, the TARDIS was materialising," she explains, deciding to tell him only what he needs to know. She won't risk changing the future. She knows too much now. Can't happen, mustn't happen. Even though she longs to tell him to stay away from Satellite Five, to never go to Earth, 2007, she can't.

That's her past. It's over and done with. Travelling with him has taught her that much at least. Her past is over and done with. Can't be changed however much she wishes it could.

"I need to see it," he replies, moving towards her and she just blinks at him dumbly. He's within touching distance and she could just hug him, but she doesn't. She can't.

"Okay." She leads him out of the TARDIS, listening as he locks the door behind him. Good. Her younger self shouldn't see this.

She's almost forgotten Tosh's presence as the woman comes to her side. "Thought he wore pin-stripes," Tosh whispers and she winces reflexively.

"Where is it?" the Doctor asks, thankfully curbing anything else that Tosh might say.

"Right over here," she says, directing him to the object that seems to have brought him into this universe. God, she's been such an idiot. "Doctor, I'm sorry."

He doesn't tell her that it's okay or give her empty platitudes. He knows that it's her fault but he just goes on with what he's doing. Looking at the device, turning it as she did, eying it carefully. "Telaxian power generator," he finally says after what seems to be an eternity.

"An' besides generatin' power an' draggin' people into other universes, what does that mean?" She worries now that she's caused some sort of fatal rip in time. Any second now, the Reapers are going to return and erase this timeline, this planet, this universe, because of her stupid mistake.

"It means that you apes are playin' with toys that you can't possibly understand. That you're messin' with technology that you shouldn't have. You should know that, Rose," he tells her, and she hears a measure of hurt and what can only be anger in his voice.

She realises suddenly that she's trembling. She should've expected this, really. It's been so long since she's last seen him, since she's last seen the TARDIS, that she should've realised that she'd be bloody emotional about it. But…but… Now anger courses through her. Righteous or not, she glares at him. "Silurians. Nestene Consciousness. Sontarans. Yeti. Cybermen. Mucking about with 'toys' is what got us through some of those encounters. You're not here, Doctor. We can't count on you to swan in an' save the day. We have to do it ourselves…" Her voice fades, too angry to speak now as she turns away from him.

She almost comes undone as she feels his hand rest upon her shoulder, feels his warmth just a few steps behind her. He's too damned close. That Doctor-shaped hole in her heart is threatening to break that much more as he deftly turns then pulls her into his embrace. "'S my turn to apologise."

His words are almost an unintelligible mumble to her as she inhales the so familiar scent of leather, despite the years between them. He's holding her. Her first Doctor is holding her, hugging her, and she can't even hear what he's saying because she feels herself crying.

She firmly pulls herself together, ignoring the burning desire that she has to snog him properly, to tell him how she truly feels to an incarnation that died before he could ever hear the words. When she withdraws from his hug, just enough to look up at him, she sees and feels him sigh.

A hand reaches up between them to touch her face for a moment, a world full of apologies in his eyes. "Don't tell me what happened, Rose. I can't know my future."

"I know," she says, lifting her hand to rub angrily at her eyes, brushing away the remnants of tears. "The last time..." She cuts herself off again before she tells him about their first time and only time together in this universe.

"Can you fix the TARDIS?" she asks, realising at that moment that the TARDIS is still alive. She was glowing when she first entered the ship, lights were still on. At least he isn't stuck, not really.

But how can he get back?

"Fixin' her 's the easy part," he tells her, releasing her from his embrace and putting a measure of distance between them again. "It's the leavin' that's the difficult part."

She blinks. What ifs swirl through her mind. What if the Doctor can't leave? What if he, and the younger her, are stuck? What if this completely re-writes the history of her proper universe, changing everything? What if the Doctor, this Doctor, doesn't die for her? What if he lives?

"That's the only device that we've found that seems to manipulate the rift. Can we, I dunno, reverse it somehow?" she asks, finally directing her attention beyond the 'he's here' to the most important aspect of setting time back onto its proper course. She knows that time's fragile and that paradoxes are even more so. There's a younger her still inside that TARDIS and, if they don't move swiftly, that Rose's bound to come outside and learn far more than she ever wanted to about fate.

_Yes, there's life after the Doctor,_ she wishes she could tell her younger self. And it's life after death.

The Doctor smiles at her, suddenly and brilliantly. That manic grin that she dreamed about for what seemed to be every night while she was with this version of him. "Oh, I dunno. Might be a bit difficult, that. Telaxians aren't known for their user's manuals. Some might even consider it impossible. But they never met me."

"An' what about..." She lets her voice trail off as she nods toward the TARDIS, knowing that he'll understand. This could take hours, days, any amount of time. Her younger self's bound to want to come outside to be near him. She knows that she wants to savour whatever time she has left with him.

She knows that she can't go with them. Too many chances of a paradox, of summoning the Reapers, of destroying everything. She's still as stuck as she was before, only now she has another reminder of what she's missing. Of what she's lost.

And she thought that she was a survivor. That Doctor-shaped hole in her heart is breaking all over again.

"We'll have to go quickly," he replies soberly. "Can't risk any more paradoxes. 'S enough that I'm seeing you now."

"Tell me what we can do to help," she says, adding Toshiko and the rest of Torchwood Cardiff into her offer. It's all she can do, right? It's her fault that he's here in the first place.

He looks at her for a long moment and she suspects that he's about to refuse. He doesn't really want to tell them how to run a Telaxian power generator. "Okay," he finally says and she smiles.

At least some good can come out of this mistake, right?

"Only, after we're gone, you've got to destroy it, Rose. 'S not meant for you lot. 'S too powerful. Ripping holes in the universe isn't something humans should ever be able to do."

Oh, god, if only he knew. She hates Yvonne Hartmann, the one from her proper universe, so much for that particular facet of Torchwood's existence. They did. And now look where she is.

"I know," she says quietly, hoping that her regrets, her fears, and all her longings aren't evident in her voice.

He stares at her for another long moment before nodding. "Then let's begin."

_To be continued..._


	2. Chapter 2: Torn

**Chapter 2: Torn**

He watches her under the guise of his repair activities. The device is devious, despite its cheap appearance. It should take all of his concentration to attempt to reverse its function, but he finds his attention drawn by her. He can't help but compare and contrast the woman who sits before him with the one who awaits him in the TARDIS.

She's wiser, that much he can tell if only by the look in her eyes. Hurt, too. She hides it well, this Rose, but she's learned from the best. He suspects – no, knows – that she was torn from his future self's side unwillingly. There's a part of her that wants to go back to her previous life, away from this alternate reality. He can't say that he blames her for this, though he's since learned that Jackie Tyler and Mickey the Idiot are here as well.

An entire family, washed ashore in an alternate world. It has all the makings of a tragedy. But he can't know the why of this situation, or even the how. It'd be too tempting to change it, to alter this future, to keep her at his side forever. It's a bit desperate, really. This wanting to keep her, though she belongs to no-one but herself (and, if he were to truly be giving, to Jackie).

She's harder, though. Pain's seen her through a lot, it seems. This is yet another aspect of that pain. She lost him; that much is obvious. This him. It was evident in how she looked when she first saw him, the desperation in how she clutched at him during their hug, the tears in her eyes when they pulled apart. It's strangely comforting to know that he's not the one who will lose her. He doubts that he'd be able to survive that particular loss. Not so soon. Not after everything that's happened to him.

There's a look in her eyes that actually reminds him of him. He understands why she feels the need to understand the generator, why she wants to know how to use it. There are no other Time Lords. Not any more. Travel between dimensions to sort out the messes that apes and other species get into is impossible now. Or, he amends, should be if it weren't for the device before him.

Throw one of these next to a temporal rift and it's amazing that it only managed to pull him through. Could've done anything, really. A thousand to one odds against getting him, but it happened and he is sorry for that if only because of her. She's lost so much and he can almost sense her fracturing before him. A pale shadow of his own loss at the beginning of this regeneration.

She's too much like him, really. He curses himself for doing that, for changing her in that way. There are some things he feels he should have the monopoly on. Pain, grief, and loss are only a few. Rose shouldn't suffer because of him.

"How long?" he asks, not certain exactly what he means to say.

She blinks at him for a moment before a wry smile twists her lips. "Two years, give or take a couple of months."

Two years without her. Vaguely he wonders how his future self is getting on. Then again, thanks to the intricacies of time travel, it's going to happen and has happened days, years, decades, centuries into the future and past. He has her and he's lost her and he's with her at the same instant, stretched to infinity. "A good life?" He's not certain if he can bear it if she says otherwise, but a cheeky grin that he knows far too well graces her face.

"Better with two," she replies, but there's little heart in the words. "It's been good, yeah. 'S not what I would've imagined for myself, but you can't really tell what's gonna happen in life, can you? I'm here an' that has to be enough."

His hearts ache for her, a woman lost in a world she'd never wanted. Much as he wishes he could take away her pain, he can't. There are some things that only time can soothe. Just as there are things that he knows he's torn apart within her just by being here. "What is this place?" he asks her, nodding towards their surroundings. Now that he's had time to truly look around, his first impressions are confirmed. It's a Tube tunnel, yes, but there's more to it than that.

There's a pterodactyl, for one thing. Not to mention computers and other odds and ends that scream 'alien' to him. She looks uncomfortable and glances away from him, shielding her eyes. "'S a bit like UNIT," she finally says, each word seeming to be reluctantly said.

"Ah." A volume of response in a word, really. UNIT. Makes sense now that he thinks about it. There're aliens in this universe, Rose has confirmed that much. They should have some way of dealing with them. Not like they've got him or any of his past selves to call upon in their time of need.

So, UNIT. "Fantastic!" he finally exclaims, gracing her with another grin. "Here you are. Defendin' the Earth. Suits you."

Hurt darts across her features as she looks at him, a slight frown turning down the corners of her mouth. "Perhaps," she says, turning her attention to the lump of metal in her hands. "What am I looking for again?"

"Hmm? Oh, right." He forces his attention back to the task at hand. He can't let himself keep getting distracted like this. Time is of the essence. "Should be a bluish-white connection, lightly painted, on that bit. If you cut it, that should give us a start at reversin' this generator."

She nods and returns to studying the metal while he focuses on the control mechanism. He's going to need to get some items from the TARDIS, but he can't let this Rose come with him. "Be right back," he says and stands, pretending not to notice how she follows him with her eyes.

As he returns to the TARDIS and slips his key into the lock, a half-born idea twists at the edges of his mind. There might be something he could do for... No. Now's not the time for such considerations. The longer he's stuck in this universe, the more likely time's going to go further off course. His presence here isn't supposed to happen. The older Rose's presence is proof enough of that. He's got to get time back on course and back to his proper universe before the Rose inside his ship discovers that her older self is outside.

He goes inside quickly, closing the doors behind him before any aspect of the exterior could be visible in the half-chance that Rose might be in the console room. He knows that her search for the TARDIS manual is a bit on the needle in a haystack end of the spectrum, but there's always a chance.

A chance, he suddenly realises as he finds himself face-to-face with an angry companion, that has suddenly become fact. "Rose! Just who I was looking for."

"'Cept for the part where you went outside without me," she snaps. "What's goin' on, Doctor?"

"Bit of a hostile environment out there for humans, Rose," he lies, hoping that she can't see through him. "Wanted to check the TARDIS's exterior, see what sort of damage she's taken."

"Yeah. Right." There's the scepticism he was expecting. Damn apes, anyway. Never listened. "You didn't need the TARDIS manual, did you, Doctor?" she asks as she tosses the heavy tome onto the captain's chair.

He glances at the book before returning his attention to her. "Course I did. Just not yet." There he goes. Lying again.

Rose looks at him and he feels as if she can see straight through his charade. "Doctor, please. Tell me what's going on! I jus' want to help!"

"You can't!" he replies, feeling the strain getting to him, causing him to snap at her as he did to her older self only a short time ago. "Rose, trust me on this, please. There isn't anything that you can do right now. Nothing outside except for dusty rocks an' a boring grey sky. 'S better if you stay in here. Wander the TARDIS. There's some rooms that haven't seen the light of day for at least a couple of centuries. Do her a bit of good to get them aired out. What do you think?"

"Then will you tell me what's going on?" she asks.

"Yup."

She looks at him suspiciously for a moment and then nods. "You'll tell me if I can help, right? Even if it's just to fetch a cuppa?"

He nods. "Of course I will." That, at least, he can promise.

Rose smiles faintly at him before disappearing into the TARDIS' interior, where he hopes she'll spend hours exploring the ship. That should keep her busy for a while. He puts his hand onto the console and murmurs a request to the ship. Though she's damaged, she hums in answer and he knows that Rose will find it almost impossible to return to the console room for a time.

Shaking his head, and dismayed by his treachery, he finds his tool-kit and extracts what he needs to reverse the generator. Reversing the generator is his first goal. The TARDIS isn't so badly damaged that she wouldn't be able to wait to be fixed until they get back to their proper universe.

He doesn't want to risk more of a paradox than there already is.

* * *

When he returns, she can't help but notice that there're a few more lines on his face, as if he's holding a world of anguish upon his shoulders. It's been a long time since she was last exposed to his moods and the knowledge that no-one knew angst as well as he did. But the knowledge flows back easily and she hopes that, by demonstrating what she's done, she can help lift even a small measure of that pain.

"Doctor? Got it," she says, holding up her bit of the generator in triumph. "No more bluish-white connection here."

He smiles at her as he all but bounds down the steps to where she, Tosh, and the few other technically minded Torchwood Cardiff personnel sit with their own bits of the generator in their hands. It was surprising, really, how easy it was to convince the others to help. Then again, she's always underestimated her own authority around Torchwood. "Fantastic! And the rest of you lot?"

Tosh gestures at her piece, dismantled before her, with the hand that isn't holding a welder. "Almost got it. Just needs a bit more work here, and the interconnecting matrix should be disconnected."

Once he seems to be satisfied with their progress, he sits across from her again and begins working on his part of the device. It's so familiar and yet it isn't. Working with him like this. Seeing him again. It's comforting, really, and she shouldn't let herself be swayed by it. He can't stay. She can't let herself fall into the trap of thinking that this could last.

She remembers a time when she told him that she'd stay with him forever. Well, best laid plans and all that rubbish. In her real universe, she died. And now here she is. Sitting across from her first Doctor, trying to send him home. She'll never see him again. God, this hurts.

He hands her another portion of the generator and she shivers as their hands touch. She just wants to hold his hand, for old time's sake (and for her own) but she forces herself to ignore that temptation and listen to his instructions. Seems simple enough. Using one of his spare sonic screwdrivers – she almost cries when she touches it – she has to re-route several of the connections. It's somewhat straightforward, really. She knows far more about alien technology than she ever had before. Even better, she's taking correspondence courses and getting her degree. Should make all of this worth it.

It doesn't, though. She bites her lip and focuses on the device, smiling as the familiar hum of the sonic screwdriver fills her ears. She's missed this. Missed him.

"Stop it," she murmurs, willing herself to listen though she knows she won't. She can't control how she feels, much as she wishes that she could. She can just hide it – as he did, no, does – behind a mask.

She knows that he's looking at her, but she refuses to meet his gaze. She's stronger than this, damnit. She knows she is.

Her fingers slip and she bites out a curse as the device sparks, stinging her fingers. Firmly telling herself to pay attention, she corrects her error in a matter of minutes. However, she can still feel him watching her with, or so she imagines, an accusing look upon his face.

The minutes pass with her achingly aware of every second. This, she supposes, is what being a Time Lord is like. Knowing the instant that every moment passes, that it might never come again despite the mastery of time. It explains, if only in part, the sadness that always lurked behind his eyes – be they blue or brown.

Her mum warned her that she was becoming too much like him.

Right. Enough meanderings. Focus. Now that she is paying attention, it's only a matter of moments before she's finished. With the re-routed connections glowing solidly within her grasp, she passes him the device, carefully keeping her eyes away from his face. It's childish, really, to not want to look at him. But she thinks that if she keeps his face, if not his voice, at bay she'll be able to survive after this is over.

"Thanks," he says softly and connects the few completed pieces he has into one whole. "There's no guarantee that this'll work."

Her lips quirk into a smile and she finds herself ignoring her earlier resolution to look into his eyes. "Is there ever?"

"'S what makes life interesting," he agrees and a myriad of emotions seem to dart across his face. "When this is completed, I'll need someone to operate it from outside. If it works properly, it should send the TARDIS back into the other universe. If it doesn't…" His voice trails off and he looks away, hiding his fears from her.

"If it doesn't?" she prompts, knowing that it can't be good. Her past self could get stuck her. He could get stuck here. And she? Well, she'll be the anomaly now, wouldn't she? All her experiences, everything that's happened to her since she's been with the Doctor past whatever point in time he's from, never would've happened. Would she vanish? Or would she be the temporal paradox in this particular situation?

He returns his attention to her as he shrugs. "I don't know. We could be stuck here. Or, well, worse."

She doesn't have to ask what 'worse' might entail. However, she knows that he has to try. They have to try. This is her fault, after all. She's brought him here. It's only right that she send him home.

"Right. Tell me what to do, then," she says, steeling herself for the inevitable. "Jus' push that red button again, yeah?"

He blinks at her, almost as if she's stunned him into silence. "Not exactly," he replies after what seems to be an eternity. "There's somethin' I've got to do first."

Before she can ask him what that is, he puts the device onto the table and moves back to the TARDIS.

It's typical, really. Once again, she's left behind with nothing more than questions. And, soon, she'll truly be left behind once and for all. No more impossible chances. No more options. Just her in a universe that's not her own.

Then again, she really should just come to the conclusion that now, well, it is her own. Will be until the day she dies, much as it hurts. She can't keep holding onto something that'll never happen. She knows this.

That doesn't mean she can actually stop.

* * *

As the doors swing shut behind him, he considers second chances. There was a point, long ago, that he only had to ask someone to come with him and they would. In an instant. In a heartbeat. They'd come.

She is the only one that he's ever asked twice. Part of that, he knows, is an example of his own need for her. She made him remember what it was like to be alive. To save the universe, a world, a person. To be himself. Memories of the war and its aftermath shaped him into the man he is today. She shapes him even now, with every smile, every joke, every sidelong glance.

Now he can see how he's shaped her.

In many ways, she's become him. Defending the Earth. Saving this world. But that's not all. She carries a measure of that same guilt that drives him. That fervour, that hope, that somehow, someway, some day she'll be able to succeed in the impossible.

He wonders if his future self has given up, decided that she's best left where she is. He wonders what it was that left Rose here, isolated from him and the universe that she knows. There's only one reason that he can think of that he'd willingly part from her.

Only one.

She must've been in danger. And he must've been certain that he wouldn't survive. Rassilon, how could he argue with that rationale? He'd do the same thing. In a heartsbeat.

Now, however, that danger's passed. Admittedly, there's another type of danger in the older Rose encountering her younger self, but he could easily sort that. As it is, he's going to have to remove his recollections of this time. He knows too much about Rose's future, and in turn his own, to let it remain.

The same holds true for the Rose who's currently wandering the TARDIS, kept occupied because of his lies. She can't remember this either. Not the turbulence, not the fall, not his revelation that they dropped into an alternate reality. But what if...

He stares blankly at the centre console, not really seeing the repair work that's yet to be done or even the hum that is his TARDIS's pulse. He's only seen a tiny aspect, a tiny measure, of what her life is in this universe. For all he knows, she could be married (no ring) or happy (never mind those tears) or want to stay here with her family (but she's the only family he has). How can he make assumptions when he doesn't know?

How can he even consider offering her a third chance? A way back?

This is where her family is. Much as he gripes about Jackie and Mickey the Idiot, he knows what they mean to her (and to himself, but he'll never say a word about it). If he takes her away, she can never come back. This would be it.

No twelve-month journeys. No popping in for a spot of tea. Nothing. Cut off. The end.

Her version of Gallifrey.

Can he do that to her?

He sighs as he walks to the console and leans against it, feeling the thrum of the ship underneath his fingers. Something tells him, though, that if she were to be offered the choice she'd choose him. The future him over her family.

He thinks that even the possibility of seeing him again would be enough. He doesn't know what he'll be like in the future. He just hopes he's ginger. Smaller ears would be nice, too. He does know, however, that how he feels wouldn't change. Can't change.

The packaging might be different, but the soul's the same. A dirty old man who shouldn't even be thinking about this.

But he is. He does.

What can he offer someone who's saved his life ten thousand times over? She doesn't know, can't know, what she's done for him. If, by doing this, he eases some small measure of the loss she feels, isn't that worth it?

In this alternate reality, he can see what's happened to her. Can see how she's changed. She's as broken as him, as hurt, because no-one truly understands what she's lost. Not Jackie, not Mickey the Idiot and most certainly not the lot outside those doors. Despite the consequences, despite everything, how can he turn away from her? From Rose?

"I can't," he says finally, making his decision.

He'll have to make certain he keeps the younger and older Roses apart, but that should be easy enough. Just a quick hop back to Earth, he'll drop off the older Rose where ever she wants and...

No. Wait. There's another factor that he hasn't weighed yet. Even if he brings Rose back to the other universe, his proper universe, how will she find him again? He has to wipe his memory of this. The consequences would be... Well, they'd be terrible. He won't remember. Won't remember saving her, won't remember where he's going to leave her, none of it.

He almost laughs at the turn his thoughts are taking. Of course she can find him. She knows him, knows how he works and knows what would (and could) attract his attention. She probably even still has that mobile he jiggery-pokeried. Even if she didn't, he can easily fix another one. Simple, really.

That'll be Rose's job.

He just has to get her there in the first place.

Decision made, he returns to the others outside the ship. The device is almost complete. He just has to connect the last piece and then he can go back to where he belongs.

Hopefully with another passenger in tow.

Once the device is put together and, hopefully, functional, he turns his attention to Rose. He's about to make his offer when she interrupts him, smiling sadly.

"Guess this is it, then," she says, her gaze haunted. "Jus' hit the red button, yeah?"

"Who says that this has to be it?" he asks.

She blinks at him, but he can see the hope that suddenly flares to life within her. "What? But Doctor, you can't..."

"Can and am," he corrects, holding out his hand and flashing her a smile. "Come with me?"

_To be continued..._


	3. Chapter 3: Goodbyes

**Chapter 3: Goodbyes**

She reels, staring at him as the full impact of his words reaches her stunned mind. He wants her to… He just…he can't…but he did…and…

Did the world just stop spinning? If only for a moment? She braces herself on the nearest solid object and winces as the chill of the metal table leeches away her heat. He just…

Oh, god. What if?

She finds her voice after what seems to be an eternity. Instead of the mindless babble that's running through her head, she manages something coherent. "You didn't mention if it happens to travel between universes."

He's asked her before to come with him. This is the fourth time. Fourth time's the charm, yeah? She wants to go back and now she can. Return with him, this him, have her proper goodbye and then find the Doctor – _her_ Doctor in pin-stripes and Chucks.

"This time, it can do anythin'," he tells her, still holding out his hand, still asking her if she wants to come with him.

God, it'd be so easy, too. Just take his hand and leave all of this behind. But she can't, can she? Not just yet. She can't behave like she did all those years before. She can't immediately throw away her life without so much as saying goodbye. Especially since she knows that this is a onetime deal. No second chances, no possibility of return.

"Doctor," she begins and she sees his face fall. "No, I'm comin'. I jus'…I need some time, y'know? I can't just up an' leave like I did before. Doesn't work like that now." She wills him to understand and she can see that he does, despite his dislike of all things domestic.

"Rose, the longer I stay, the worse the paradox. Every second, every hour, is another chance that time unravels further. For this universe and our own," he tells her and she feels guilty.

God, this is what she wants. She can just call her mum, tell her what's happened, and…

Never see her or Mickey again. The end. She told him once that, even over her family, she chose him. That's still true, she knows. She wants to go. Only the image of her mum crying overwhelms her. This'll tear her apart, she knows. Despite having John in her life – and she'll miss her little brother – she knows. Oh, this hurts so much.

"I know," she says, steeling herself. "I jus' need to call my mum. An' Mickey. Tell 'em that… well… " Her voice trails off without completing her thought, but she can see that he knows what she means to say.

"I know," he says and she can see a shadow of the same guilt that haunts her in his eyes. "Try not to be too long, then," he says and turns, leaving her with Tosh as he walks back to the TARDIS. He never did do domestic, this Doctor, but he's giving this to her because he knows what this means. He's giving her a way back home.

She has to take it.

Ignoring Tosh's accusing stare, she fishes her mobile out from her pocket and keys in her mum's number. This is going to be the most difficult call of her life.

The call was picked up immediately. "Rose! Oh, I was hoping you'd call, love. That nice boy Eric was askin' 'bout you. An' I told 'im, I did, tha'…" Jackie barely leaves her enough time to get a word in edgewise, but she manages.

"Mum! Mum, listen, I don't have long..." she begins and her mum's voice cuts her off immediately.

"What is it, sweetheart?"

"'S jus'…I 'ave this chance, Mum, an' I've got to take it," she says, bracing herself for the inevitable denial. She needs to tell her. Just a few little words is all that it'd take, but she finds words have abandoned her.

"It's _him_, isn't it?" Jackie replies and she thinks she hears resignation in her mum's voice. "You've found a way back, yeah?"

"Yeah," she says. "Mum, I..."

"I know, sweetheart. Always knew, I did. Ever since Norway. Before that, really. If there was a way…" Jackie's voice breaks over the phone and she feels her own tears beginning to start. "You can't come back, can you?"

"No," she says and now it's her turn for her voice to break. "'S a one-way trip, Mum. It's too dangerous otherwise. An'… I jus'… I have to do it."

"An' what happens if you do? If he drops you off somewhere, or he sends you away 'cause it's too dangerous, what're you gonna do then? You won't have me to run back to, sweetheart. It'll jus' be you."

"I'll figure something out," she replies firmly, not letting that thought sway her. "I don't belong here, Mum. I belong with him."

"Do you know he still wants you back?" Jackie asks. "If you manage to get back there, if you manage to find him, what's to say he won't have another girl with him? He's trouble, that one."

"Doesn't matter," she says and she believes that. Not because she's convinced that he's in love with her (no matter how much she thinks that's what he was going to say on that beach). Not because she thinks that he needs her (and maybe he does or doesn't). No, she wants to go back because that's where she belongs. She knows she belongs there. Even if it's not with him, though she wants desperately for that to be true.

She's survived this long without him and she still loves him. Will love him until she dies. No, she wants to do this for herself.

"You love him," Jackie says, as if that explains everything.

"Yeah, I do."

"Then let him go. Stay here, please, sweetheart. I don't want to lose you. Not again," her Mum says and she sobs softly at the plea.

"I can't, Mum. I _can't_. I need to go for me. Not him. Even if he has someone else with him, that's okay. 'S better that way. He can't be alone," she replies.

"An' you? You'll be alone. All by yourself in another universe. You won't 'ave me or Mickey. You'll be alone an' that's gonna change you. You won't be Rose Tyler anymore."

"Yeah, I will be, Mum. 'S still me. I have to do this. Please…" Please don't make this harder than it already is, she thinks.

"Then can I see you? Jus'…jus' to say goodbye properly? 'Fore you go?" She can hear the desperate hope in her mum's voice, just as she knows that even if she could, her mum wouldn't let her go.

She closes her eyes feeling the lump rise in her throat. "There isn't enough time, Mum. This way back…the longer I wait, the more damage it does. I jus'…I had to call you. To say…goodbye."

"I… Rose, I… " Now her tears are starting in earnest. "Sweetheart, are you sure?"

"Yes," she says. "I am. 'S where I belong."

Jackie doesn't bother with protests, with asking why she's leaving her life here behind. Her mum knows. "I love you, Rose, y'hear? An' your dad does too. An' John. Just promise me something. If you can come back or call, try. I don't… I love you."

"Love you too, mum," she says. "I… I hope I'll be seein' ya someday, yeah? If not… I'll miss you."

"I'm missing you already," her mum replies, sobbing openly.

"Goodbye," she says softly, closing her eyes against the sting of her tears.

Jackie doesn't even get the words out; it's more a strangled version of 'byeiloveyou'. The last thing she hears as she hits the 'end' button is the sound of her mother's tears.

Biting her lip, she dials another number, still ignoring Tosh's accusing look. This isn't abandonment, damnit. It isn't. She's going back to where she belongs.

Mickey answers after the third ring, but it doesn't take as long to describe what she's planning to him as it did to her mum. He doesn't bother with giving her reasons why this is a bad idea. Doesn't warn her that she won't have anyone to run to should the Doctor chose to leave her again.

He knows better; and, for that, she's thankful.

"Do me a favour, yeah? Don't put up with his crap, Rose. Don't let him take you for granted. You're better than that, an' he should know it. An' Rose, if you can, think of me? Once in a while?" Mickey asks and she fights back the re-emergence of her tears.

"Course I will," she replies. "Take care of my mum, if you can. An', Mickey? Thanks for everything." She can't put into words everything that he's meant to her over the years. Everything that he's done for her or put up with in spite of her. He's been her anchor for so long. She had to say goodbye to him once.

Now is only the last in a long line of goodbyes.

"You're welcome. I'll be seein' you," he replies and hangs up without saying a proper goodbye. Mostly, she suspects, because he wants to believe that he'll see her again.

She thinks that this is it. The end of an era, really, much as it was the instant that damn wall separated her from the Doctor. She has her family here, yes. But what she wants and needs is in that other dimension. She's making the right choice.

"Why?" Toshiko asks, interrupting her thoughts.

She turns to her friend and smiles sadly, hating this goodbye just as much as she did the others. "Because I 'ave to, Tosh. 'S where I belong."

"You belong here, Rose. We need you. Need your knowledge. I doubt we ever would've figured that Silurian situation out without you," Toshiko says. Now that's one thing she doubts. The Silurian situation was easy. Apply a bit of explosive and that's it. The end. No more aliens from the dawn of time trying to take over the world. Anyone could've figured that out. Didn't have to be her.

"No, I don't belong here," she corrects. "You'll be fine without me. I know you, Tosh. Know Torchwood. You lot can survive jus' as well without me as with. Besides, things'll be a bit easier now without me around to argue with."

"No, they won't," Tosh says. "You're being selfish."

"Maybe I am," she replies and, much as it should, that accusation doesn't sting. "But this is my last chance, Tosh. You know that this is what I've been doing for the past two years, what I was working for."

"And if you can't find the one you're looking for?" Tosh asks. "What then? You won't have Torchwood either, Rose. Your family, your friends are here."

"I'll survive," she replies with a shrug. "I'm getting' rather good at that now. Besides, my family's there, too." She looks towards the TARDIS, feeling homesick for its familiar hums and the rooms inside her transdimensional walls.

"Rose," Tosh begins, but she holds up a hand to quell the inevitable 'are you sure you're doing the right thing?' question.

"It'll be okay," she says and pulls the other woman into a quick hug. "Thanks, Tosh, for being my friend."

"Not a very good one," Tosh says, shaking her head. "Not if I can't convince you that you're making a mistake."

"Maybe I am, but it's my mistake to make. Goodbye, Toshiko. Take care of Torchwood. An' if you run into any large people with flatulence problems, check for zips in their foreheads. They might explode on contact with vinegar."

Toshiko shakes her head and sighs. "When should I activate the device?"

"Give us five minutes an' then hit the button. And, Tosh? When it's over, you've got to destroy it. 'S too dangerous otherwise."

"Rose, we-" Tosh begins and cuts herself off, shaking her head. "Yeah, we'll destroy it," the other woman promises.

"Thanks," she says.

"Yeah. Goodbye, Rose," Toshiko replies and she can tell that her friend still disagrees with her decision.

Before Tosh can say anything else, she walks to the TARDIS, feeling as if a great weight has suddenly been lifted from her. She'll miss the people here, yes. Miss her mum and Pete and John. Miss Mickey and Tosh. But she won't miss this planet. Won't miss this universe. It's not where she belongs.

She smiles sadly as she presses her hand against the side of the TARDIS. Yes, she thinks, _this_ is where she should be.

And she opens the door to a new life. Or, perhaps, a return to her old one.

* * *

He watches her as she walks into the TARDIS, easily seeing behind the smile to the sorrow that lurks beneath. She's hurting and he knows that it's his fault. Perhaps he shouldn't've offered, despite his own desires. He's taking her away from her family. Oh, sure, he's done it before, but this is different.

There are no happy returns possible for this particular Rose Tyler. She's going to be stuck in her own universe, yes, but without that anchor that he's always suspected defines her. Without that tether to humanity, what will she become? Another him?

No, he thinks. She's already him, just without the centuries of hurt and pain. No, she just has twenty-odd years worth of it. And now he's adding that much more.

"Rose," he says, beginning to ask her for a final time if she's certain that this is what she truly wants. He'll understand if she prefers to stay behind with her family. She can belong here (no matter how much he selfishly wants her with him and can't imagine that changing no matter the face he's wearing).

"Stop," she commands, shaking her head. "I know what you're gonna say, Doctor. An' the answer is that this is what I want. I want to go home."

He stares at her for a long moment, his jaw tightening in reaction. He knows what she's implying. That the TARDIS, that he, is her home. Not with her mum or Mickey the Idiot. Him. Here.

"Then come here," he tells her, holding out his hand. He might not say it, but he'll let the final decision be hers.

She grasps his hand in her own, entwining their fingers.

"See this lever?" he asks her, pointing at it with his free hand. "When I tell you, pull it downward."

Rose looks at him for a moment before doing as he asks. Something in her expression tells him that she knows why he's telling her this. It's one last chance for her to change her mind. In the end, it will be her choice.

No matter how much he feels that it's his fault she's choosing this. Choosing him over them. He tells himself that it's wrong to even feel a measure of gladness that she's making this decision, choosing to come with him. She might not be his Rose, but she was. And will be again.

Shaking himself out of his contemplations, he turns his attention to the controls. There should be an energy spike just before the Telaxian power generator activates. Should being the operative word. Oh, no. Wait. There it is. "Rose? Now."

There's no hesitation as she pulls the lever, though he can hear her crying softly. He wants to pull her into his arms, but the TARDIS is beginning to shake again. "You've got to keep out of the way of the other you, Rose," he warns her as he lets go of her hand to twist a knob. "She's probably in the library or the Cloisters, so you've got to stay here. Y'see, you can't touch. It's..."

"I know," she says, interrupting his explanation. She's still crying, but her tears are abating somewhat. Probably, he supposes, because of the tremors currently running through the TARDIS. "Reapers. End of the world. Explosions. All that."

He wants to know how she knows that, but he doesn't. Something tells him that it's something he's better off not knowing about. A rather violent shudder forces him to focus on the controls. He makes a mental note that the next time he decides to redesign the console he should put the stabilisation controls in the same place. It makes things rather difficult when he has to dart around the console, flipping switches, twisting knobs, pulling levers and pumping pumps to keep his beautiful ship in one piece.

That's the problem with his people being gone. This used to be simple, easy. No problem. Just a quick jaunt into a parallel world and then return, just like that, to your place of origin. Then again, it has been several centuries since he's last had a jaunt into a parallel world. Maybe he's remembering things being easier than they actually were.

Now, though, the Void is a treacherous place. A hell between universes and his ship isn't meant to transverse its deadly expanse. However, it is now. He can only hope that, with that little extra push the power generator gave them, they can punch through to the proper universe.

He certainly doesn't fancy spending an eternity stuck between universes. Especially not in such a paradoxically charged atmosphere as the TARDIS is at the moment. Two Rose Tylers...

Right.

Enough of that.

That is, of course, when he realises that things have gone from bad to much, much worse. He can hear the Cloister Bell.

_Gong. Gong. Gong._

"Oh, no. No, no, no. Don't do that," he mutters, pushing Rose out of the way in his desperate attempt to maintain the TARDIS' structural integrity.

"Doctor? What's that?" Rose asks.

He doesn't bother answering as he tries something else. Maybe if he just turns this knob twenty-five kern to the off… No. No, that's almost an ape-worthy thought. Stupid idea. Now if he tries _forty_ kern… Oh, yes. That could do it.

The bell is getting louder. He can feel the TARDIS screaming around him, in his head. If he doesn't manage to fix this soon, the ship will fall apart. Her internal dimensions are destabilising. Entire rooms are disappearing.

That's when he realises that he's got another problem.

"Doctor! 'S there anything…" Rose again, but wait. Why did her voice echo?

Before he can do or say anything, the TARDIS jolts again and he sees inevitability staring him in the face.

There's a Rose next to him and there's a Rose holding onto the edges of the interior doorway.

The bell is sounding frantic now, or perhaps it's just him, as another tremor shakes the younger Rose loose from her precarious grip.

He doesn't have to be a genius to see her trajectory.

She's heading straight towards…

_GONG._

_To be continued..._


	4. Chapter 4: Survival

**Chapter 4: Survival**

She's heard that sound before. When the Doctor went a little mad that Christmas, she recalled hearing that bell. It seemed just as ominous then as it does now. They're in danger, she knows. Terrible, terrible danger. It's all she can do to hold onto the railing and pray that it stays stable. She certainly doesn't fancy finding herself crashing into a wall, or the console, or the Doctor. Especially when he needs all his attention on steering the TARDIS.

She begins to ask if there's anything she can do, but doubts that he'll answer. She really shouldn't say anything, especially considering their current predicament. Travelling through the Void… She shivers once and then realises that they aren't alone. She's standing on the other side of the room. Well, not her, but her younger self.

She really did wear too much eyeliner, didn't she?

That frivolous thought occurs to her seconds before she realises the additional danger. She can't see herself. She can't...

Her younger self meets her gaze, eyes widening for a moment before the TARDIS shakes hard enough to send the other her careering towards her. She dodges out of the way, releasing her hold on the railing to try to keep the centre console between them.

She thinks that the Doctor has yet to take her to see her dad. Part of her wants to warn him, to warn herself, but she knows she can't. The past is the past for her. She can't change it, much as she wishes she could.

Her younger self hits the railing, mere inches from where she would've been had she stayed there. She, however, has managed to get to the other side of the console. Keeping both it and the Doctor between them.

She's almost deafened by the sounds around her. Her heartbeat thuds dully in her ears as she hangs onto a strut and keeps a wary eye on the other Rose. The bell's tempo has increased as has the Doctor's frantic attempts to keep the TARDIS intact.

It's getting louder. Though if that's the bell or the sound of her heart, she doesn't know. She feels as if she's been running in a marathon, her chest heaving as she tries to pull in more oxygen. Oxygen.

Oh, hell.

She can't get enough air. "Doctor," she says faintly. "The atmosphere…" She doesn't have the breath to say more. On the other side of the console, she can see that her other self is having the same difficulties. That Rose, though, is close enough to the captain's chair to collapse into it.

She has nothing other than the floor. And a rather nice floor it is, too. She feels hot and dizzy. Colours seem alternately sharper or dimmer as she looks at the console. It is such a lovely shade of green…

Her chest hurts, but she can't remember why this is a bad thing. Bad thing? No. No, Bad Wolf. Yes. Much better. Who's afraid of the big Bad Wolf?

Definitely not her…

She sinks slowly to the floor (why is it shaking?), resting her head against the strut behind her. She's content to watch the man (Doctor?) as he desperately does something at the console. She wonders why he's so frantic. There's no need. Everything's fine.

_I suppose…if this is the last time I can say it…Rose Tyler…_

There's darkness at the edges of her vision and she's not certain why. (A beach?) Maybe that'd explain…

She doesn't get to complete the thought as the darkness rushes in, overwhelming even the cacophony of the bell and the beeps of the console. And she knows no more.

* * *

He finds that hitting the console with the soft mallet seems to help, if only a little. Or, perhaps, he's only consoling himself with the action. The TARDIS is spinning, bits of her falling off into the Void and there's nothing he can do to stop it. Oh, he's tried. Tried dozens of things. Thousands. Didn't even occur to him that going back would be far worse than coming and that was bad enough.

What little repairs he already finished are coming apart at the seams. The TARDIS screams in his mind, telling him that she's dying. And he knows. Rassilon, he knows and he's done this to her on his frantic quest to return home. To maintain history. To maintain the timeline.

He's as much of an idiot as those stupid apes he complains about. He knows that the atmosphere is getting thin. Already it's sent his human companion – companions, he corrects himself – to sleep. If he doesn't manage to repair at least the environmental system – and soon - his respiratory bypass system is going to kick in. Sadly, once it does, he's going to be of little use to anyone.

His eyes harden as he keeps one hand on the stabiliser. He's not going to lose. His ship's not going to die. He's not going to die. And, most especially, Rose isn't going to die. Neither of them. No, they're going to live. He stretches his other hand underneath the console. If he can switch crystals by feel alone – not to mention keeping them on course through the Void - he should be able to re-start the environmental systems.

A few minutes later, despite contortions that he never wants to repeat and at least two instances of almost dropping the crystals, he manages to restart the environmental system. Yet, much as he wants to check over his companions, he can't. His attention must focus on the stabiliser. If he can keep the TARDIS in one piece for long enough, he should be...

What a moment. The bell. The Cloister Bell. It's stopped. The danger's over. Well, most of it. He just has to nurse the TARDIS into landing somewhere safe for a bit and then, after lots of repair work – "I'm so sorry, old girl," he murmurs his apologies and the ship hums slightly in response – he can…

"Rose!" Her name practically leaps to his lips as he sets the materialisation sequence. He can't be picky about where they end up. Even if it's Cardiff, it'll do. He turns towards her – his Rose – and checks for her pulse. She's alive, though he suspects she'll have a rather nasty headache when she wakes up. Probably best that he does this now, then. Before history's altered any further.

Pressing two of his fingers against her temple, he closes his eyes and searches for her memories of the time spent in the alternate dimension. He – at least this him – doesn't like using this particular ability. It's still too raw from memories of the War.

Rose whimpers slightly under his touch and he comforts her mentally, even as he steals her memories. It's hard, he finds, to withdraw from her. There're reasons that this particular ability is, or rather was, discouraged and this is one of them. It's soothing to be this close to her, to feel her around him. It's a balm, really, and one he can't afford to take. Her presence has to be enough. She's far too young.

He detaches his mind from hers after a few more moments, leaving in his wake a command to sleep. She'll sleep well, and deeply, now for at least eight hours. More than enough time, really, to sort his other problem.

He'll take her to her bedroom shortly. First, he wants to check the other Rose Tyler. She's starting to come around when he reaches her side, momentary panic filling her features before she recognises him.

"You okay? An' the TARDIS?" she asks immediately and he's momentarily surprised by her question. Then again, her first concern's always been for others. That's just the way she is.

"Takes more than that to hurt me," he says, grinning. "The TARDIS, though, she's hurtin'. But, with a few hours worth of repairs, she'll be as good as new. Been meanin' to replace some of those circuits anyway. We've materialised, anyway, an' in one piece. You?"

"A bit bruised, but I've had worse happen to me before. What happened?" she asks before looking chagrined. "No, wait. Stupid question. We went through the Void. An' I heard that bell ag…" She cuts herself off, as if she realises who she's talking to. "Sorry."

He shrugs. "'S okay." Offering her his hand, he helps her to her feet, steadying her as she sways. "Oxygen deprivation. You'll be wobbly for a few minutes, jus' until your feet get back under you."

"An' what about the other me?" she asks, looking around him towards where that Rose is currently sleeping.

"Oh, she's fine. Jus' sleeping. So, Rose Tyler," he begins and she stops him by pressing her fingers against his lips.

"I know," she says. "Figure this is it. Can't stick around for her-" she nods at the girl on the chair "-to wake up. The TARDIS' hurting an' I don't want to make you move her any more than you have to. So…I figure I'll see what's outside those doors. Hopefully it's on Earth, but if it isn't, that's okay too."

He tries to protest around her finger, but she shakes her head. "No, Doctor. 'S the right thing for me to do. Got to sort the timeline out somehow, yeah? An' she's your companion now. Jus' do me a favour…" She bites her lip and shakes her head and he thinks she changes her mind about what to say. "Show her a fantastic life."

Rose drops her hand away from his lips and he tries to ignore the phantom pressure he still feels against them. "I will," he says.

She bites her lip and looks at him intently, a myriad of emotions crossing her face. "You're going to forget this, yeah? Forget me? Well, this me."

He nods. "I have to. Can't remember what's going to happen. 'S my future. Not to mention your own."

A bittersweet smile crosses her face. "Then, Doctor, I never got the chance to say goodbye to you. To this you. Not properly, anyway." Before he can say anything to that astonishing statement, she reaches up and presses a soft kiss against his lips.

He can taste the salt from her tears as he returns that gentle pressure. It's not demanding, nor is it entirely devoid of passion. It just is.

When she breaks the kiss, she rocks back on her heels and smiles at him through her tears. "Thanks, Doctor."

He can't help but wonder at what that kiss means. He regenerates before she has the chance to say goodbye, yet she kisses him. Is their relationship… No. He can't even think about that. Not now. Not when she's standing before him, still crying.

Without thinking, he pulls her into his embrace, tightening his arms around her. "Thank you," he replies and releases her after he feels her tears abate somewhat.

She looks at him for another long moment and he suspects that she's memorising his face, much as he's doing the same. Sadly, he won't remember this. Not ever. Much as he wishes he could.

"Goodbye," she whispers and turns, heading towards the doors.

"Rose," he says, arresting her movements. "Go to any bank an' ask to withdraw money from your account. There's going to be…"

"Doctor," she replies, shaking her head. "I won't accept charity."

"Rose, from what you've told me or what I've guessed, they think you're dead. You'll need the money. Take it. I do the same thing for all my companions." He reaches into his pocket and pulls out a leather fold, tossing it towards her. "An' take that too. At least for a bit. Call it identification. You can give it back when you see me again."

She grins, that grin where just the tip of her tongue touches the top of her teeth, and reaches into her pocket and pulls out an identical fold. "'S okay. Got one of my own." And she throws his back to him.

He smiles. "Fantastic. Don't forget what I said, though, about the account. Even if they've got you listed as dead, it'll still be there. Can even call yourself a relative if you like. But it's there for you any time you want it."

She looks like she's about to object again, but seems to decide against it. "Thanks again," she finally says.

"You're welcome," he replies.

"Oh," she says, just before she goes. "There's somethin' I never got to tell you – this you. Suppose you already know, but…I wanted to say. I love you."

He gapes at her, unsure of what to say. However, it seems that he's not expected to say anything at all. Oh, he's suspected as much. He knows how he feels, though he'd never say. But, before he could even attempt to respond, she leaves him behind.

Oh, he's still got her. She's sleeping just behind him, but now he knows. This is what it's like and he was right. Genius, him. He knew it'd hurt when she left him.

And it does.

Never mind that now he knows she doesn't leave him…in the end, it takes a universe to separate them. Perhaps he should feel some comfort from that. Then again, in a few minutes, he won't remember even that.

Shaking his head, he turns towards Rose and gently lifts her into his arms. He'll put her to bed, fix a few of the systems, send them into the Vortex and wipe his memories. It's a plan.

As he carries her deep into the TARDIS, he thinks he hears her mumble something about 'dad', but he suspects that it's just his imagination. When he reaches her room, he tucks her in, covering her with her heavy duvet. "Sleep well," he tells her softly and presses a brief kiss against her forehead.

Just as well that he won't remember any of this, he thinks. His lips are still tingling from the memory of her kiss. Without another thought on the matter, he leaves Rose to sleep and returns to his repairs.

Six hours and a flurry of repairs later, he wakes from what he thinks is a brief nap. Hopefully Rose will be up soon. Apes sleep far too much, he thinks. Waste away their lives, they did.

Maybe he'll let her chose their destination this time. Yes. That sounds like a fantastic idea.

Which is exactly what he does.

* * *

It would have to be Cardiff.

She laughs, both at herself and at her good fortune, as she walks away from the TARDIS. Same old landing spot. Same old fountain. Same old stadium. Same old Millennium Centre. Question is, though, what's the date? She can't stop some random passer-by and ask something that simple. Well, she can, but she'd rather not attract undue attention.

Admittedly, the Doctor does it all the time. What works for him should work for her too, right? Right. With that thought in mind, she asks the first person who crosses her path what the date is. The answer of September 22nd doesn't tell her much, but it's a start.

Depending on the year, though, she might be in trouble in a few weeks. She'll have to find a newsagent, then. Look at one of the papers, see what it says. If it's 2006, she'll need to find somewhere else to wait for the Doctor. If not, well, she'll have to check for references to the ghosts and the Cybermen. That'll tell her if she's in the right time.

That will only get her so far. She still needs to be certain that she's finding him at the proper time. She can't contact him before she's left and she doesn't want to contact him if he's got a companion.

She tells herself it's not petty on her part, but she doesn't want to compete. Besides, she doesn't really know if he'd want her to come back. She thinks he would, but how can she know for certain?

Now that she's here, though, it's a little too late for such doubts. If she lets them overwhelm her, she might as well have stayed in that other universe with her mum. First things first, she needs to sort out the date. Then onto withdrawing money – much as she wishes she didn't have to rely upon him for help with this, she knows that she has no choice.

She's been, after all, declared dead in this universe. Or, perhaps, will be. Date questions, again. Smoothing her jacket absently, she tries to find the nearest newsagent. Big city like this, there should be at least one near the Millennium Centre.

She's not certain what gave them away, but she realises that someone's following her when she's a few streets away from the Centre.

It doesn't take her long to steal a glance at her tails – one man, one woman. She doesn't recognise them, but that means nothing. The man has a thin, overly wide mouth and is wearing casual clothes. She can't really see the woman's face; just that she has dark hair and is wearing jeans and some sort of red blouse - nor does it take a genius to realise just who they are. Stupid, she is. Really. There's bound to be a Torchwood in Cardiff, just like there was back in the other universe. And she didn't exactly have the most inconspicuous of arrivals. Big blue box parked right in front of the fountain and she got out of it.

If it's the wrong time, they'll want to talk to her about the Doctor. No, worse. They'll want her to help them capture him. Right. Just means she has to lose them. Better to be safe rather than sorry.

She makes a show of reading the newspaper, her eyes flicking to the date and back again. At least it's 2007. Means it's after the Cybermen and her previous visits here. Yet that doesn't mean Torchwood wants her for an innocent reason. No, there's no telling if there's another madwoman (or man) in command here.

She puts the newspaper back, shaking her head at the proprietor when he asks if she wants to buy it. As she straightens, she casually glances around herself and fights back a grin when her friends from Torchwood try desperately to look as if they belong.

Amateurs.

Anyone could've spotted them by now. Even someone without the training the other Torchwood gave her. Without the training she got from the Doctor. Idiots. Right. Best see about losing them now, then. She suspects that they're trying to avoid causing a scene, really. Probably why they haven't tried to take her – or, rather, disappear her – as she suspects the Torchwood of this universe is apt to do.

She walks down the street, pausing every so often to peer in store windows as an excuse to check that her friends are still following her. Once that's confirmed, a smile creeps across her features. Oh, yes, she is going to enjoy this.

Without telegraphing her movements, she darts into an opening in the traffic, cutting to the other side of the road. A few blared horns and about an equal number of curses follow her as she runs. Good thing about travelling with the Doctor and, later, her job. She's certainly kept fit.

She hears horns blare again behind her and she knows that her pursuers have crossed the street as well. Right, then. Time to really lose them. The first intersection she comes to, she turns. Thankfully, there's a rather large crowd down this street. She should be able to lose her friends easily.

It really doesn't take long. Just a few more twists and turns, not to mention at least three cases of doubling back, that she finally loses them. They were persistent; she has to give them that. At least this way, not only has she lost them, she's also managed to find a branch of her own bank.

Patting her pocket to make sure the psychic paper is still there, she walks inside. It takes some haggling, answering security questions such as her date of birth and her mum's maiden name and showing the psychic paper to four different people – all higher up in the chain of command, if she doesn't miss her guess – before she's accepted as being who she says she is.

This lack of identification, not to mention being declared dead, is getting rather annoying. She's going to have to sort that, and soon. Then again, she realises her other problem. She doesn't have a CV. Well, she does, but not one she can reference here. Different universe.

Bugger. She didn't even think about that. Doesn't matter what she knows if she can't prove it. She'd either have to work in a shop again – never – or go back to school – again, not a favoured option – or find some other means of supporting herself. Torchwood is an impossibility. She doesn't fancy being one of their specimens, brought out into the light only when they need her for her knowledge of the Doctor. She'll just have to come up with something else.

She's chewing on a fingernail when the bank manager returns with a sheaf of papers. He tells her that the account she's withdrawing from is one of their oldest and most valuable accounts. When she hears just how much money is in that account, she almost collapses from shock.

_I do this for all my companions_, he said. For a bloke who doesn't tend to carry money, he certainly is rather well off. Then again, she's had time to think about it. Time travel would make simple things like making money simple. Of course he has money. He just doesn't tend to carry it with him.

Shaking her head at her thoughts, she names a far lower sum for her first withdrawal, saying that a few hundred pounds will do for now. She feels rather nervous when she's handed the crisp bills. Oh, she's had money. Pete is – no, was, she corrects herself. That's the past now – a multi-millionaire. She's just never had to carry this much money before.

Thanking the banker politely, she takes the money and secures it as best she can. She doesn't want to present herself as a likely target, after all. Now she'll have to sort out a place to stay, as well as a change of clothes. With a sigh, she sets out to do just that. And, with any luck, she'll have that done before the sun sets.

* * *

No vacancy.

Figures that she'd get dropped in Cardiff the night some big concert is in town. The various hotels, inns and bed and breakfasts she's visited have all been booked solid. Really, it's all she can do to find a kebab stand that isn't too crowded to get herself something to eat. She hoped she could stay close to the Millennium Centre, despite the proximity to Torchwood, so she could be ready when the Doctor arrives.

However fate seems to be betting against her. It takes several hours, but she finally finds a bed and breakfast in Splott with a vacancy. It's small enough to not be on Torchwood's radar, which is a major factor in her search. There is, after all, a possibility that Torchwood's still searching for her. Staying here will make it that much harder to find her.

The owner, a Mrs. Caldwell, is an elderly woman in what she suspects is her late seventies. She welcomes her with open arms, saying nothing about the state of her clothing or the bag of shopping she's brought with her.

"It's a man, isn't it?" Mrs. Caldwell asks, a knowing gleam in her eyes. "Oh, don't bother answering, dear. I know the signs. Go on upstairs. Second door on the right's all yours. Breakfast is at seven."

Thanking her politely, she goes upstairs and settles herself into the room after locking the door. She sets the bag of clothing is on the armchair and places the contents of her pockets as well as her holster and weapon on the bedside cabinet. Mechanically stripping herself of her clothes, she's barely awake by the time she shuts off the light and curls under the duvet.

Her first day back in her own universe and she hasn't accomplished much. Then again, how can she? She realises that she hasn't planned this as well as she should've. Just hopped into the TARDIS with the Doctor, travelled here and left him behind.

Oh, she knows she couldn't stay with him. Temporal paradoxes aren't something she desires to see ever again. However, there's still the fact that she hasn't been thinking. Her original mobile was destroyed in the Silurian invasion and she forgot to ask the Doctor to jiggery-pokery her current mobile so she could call him. That would've been the simplest way to find him again, she realises.

Admittedly, there's no reason she can assume she's calling him at the right time. Might be a younger or an older version of him. One who doesn't know her, does know her and has her with him, or knew her and has someone else with him. It's the same dilemma. Doesn't mean that she isn't kicking herself for not thinking about it sooner.

Then there's the matter of identification. Psychic paper can only get her so far before she encounters someone that's immune to it. She's dead here. Inevitably, it will take months to sort out the legal paperwork to prove that she's still alive. Not to mention the lack of means to get a job.

Sure, the Doctor's money will go a long way but that doesn't mean it's enough. She won't live on his charity. Besides, she has to occupy her days somehow, right? It's with those disturbing thoughts that she finally falls asleep.

She wakes some unknown time later to the sound of pounding on her door. It's a sharp sound, almost military-like in its precision. It certainly doesn't sound like what she'd expect from Mrs. Caldwell.

"Miss Tyler, please open the door," someone says and she winces at hearing the sound of her name. She never told Mrs. Caldwell who she really was. Just that her name was Rose Smith.

All of which mean that someone's found her. An organisation of some sort, at least. And, knowing her luck, it's Torchwood.

_To be continued..._


	5. Chapter 5: Defending the Earth

_Note: This chapter contains subject matter slightly over the PG-13 rating, though it is not explicit. Not enough to merit an increase in the rating of this fic in my opinion._

* * *

**Chapter 5: Defending the Earth**

The pounding grows more insistent, the calls of her name are louder and she knows that she needs to answer the door before it gets knocked in. She dresses quickly, securing her possessions about herself as best she can. Without saying a word, she straps on the holster and rests her hand on the handle of the weapon as she steps to the door.

The door creaks slightly as she opens it a crack, peering into the dimly lit hallway. The man pauses, his hand uplifted to strike the door once more, and she looks at it disdainfully as he drops it.

"Miss Tyler?" he asks and she takes a moment to look at him. He's an older man, but he holds himself with a sharp military bearing that belies his casual clothes. She doesn't recognise him, but he doesn't seem like the sort she'd find in Torchwood. Military, perhaps, but not Torchwood.

"My name's not Tyler," she says, and she's proud that her voice doesn't falter.

The man smiles. "I am Colonel Benton, Miss Tyler. Your caution does you great service, but it's unnecessary. I am not here to hurt you. Rather, I'm here to offer you a job."

She blinks at him. "I already told you, Colonel. My name's not Tyler."

Benton's smile doesn't waver. "Rose Tyler. Formerly of the Powell Estates in London. Currently on the books as having been killed in the Cyberman invasion in 2007, along with your mother. A known associate of the Doctor. You travelled with him in two incarnations, from what we understand. It's always a bit unnerving when he does that, isn't it? You can never tell when the next bloke that comes up to you and mentions UNIT isn't actually some version of the Doctor."

UNIT. Rose doesn't let her shock show, though she suspects she might've given herself away when the man mentioned her mum. Last she heard, most of UNIT's alien experts were killed in the Slitheen attack on Downing Street. Maybe they're after her so she can be some sort of alien expert? Can't be the Doctor, at least it doesn't sound like it. Then again, how can she tell? Just because Benton knows about regenerations doesn't make him a friend.

"What does UNIT want with me?" she asks, keeping her hand on her gun. "Assumin', of course, that you haven't made a mistake."

The colonel seems honest enough, but she's still suspicious. "Your help. In return, UNIT can sort out any legal issues that remain after your…disappearance."

"That's not all you want," she replies, deciding that it's not worth pretending any longer. "You want the Doctor."

Benton surprises her by laughing. "Couldn't keep him even if we wanted to. The Brigadier – both of them – have tried. We're not after him, Rose. Not like Torchwood. If anything, we want to protect him from them so he can keep on doing what he's doing."

Her fingers loosen their grip on the gun. "Still doesn't answer why you want me. You say you want my help. How can I help you?"

He looks at her as if she's just said something particularly dense. "You've travelled with the Doctor. You've seen things that few people on Earth have ever seen. You've even, unless we miss our guess, seen parallel universes. He doesn't take people who are stupid with him on his adventures, Rose. Which means you've got something that we need. Something that we can use."

"An' what about Torchwood? If you want me, they probably want me that much worse," she replies.

"There's no question about that. If we hadn't intercepted the transmission, you would've had someone from Torchwood knocking on your door instead of me. We can protect you, Rose. They won't be able to touch you if you're with us."

Two organisations are fighting over her. It'd be funny if it wasn't so serious. She holds no illusions over what Torchwood will do with her should they get her. Probably lock her up as some sort of bait – or worse. She already knows that there are some anomalies in her blood, things that even the Doctor doesn't know about. Things that she discovered while working at the Torchwood on that other Earth.

Seems she's got no choice, at least not one she can see. "An' would I be free to leave when I choose it?"

He's shocked. "You're not a prisoner."

"Okay," she says finally, releasing her grip on her weapon and opening the door wide.

"Okay?" he repeats, almost as if he's unsure as to what she means.

"I'll join you," she replies, feeling as though a weight has been removed from her. UNIT can help, she knows. Will help. And she'll help them.

Until, of course, she finds the Doctor again.

* * *

She's not certain what she imagined would happen when she returned to her proper universe. An immediate reunion with the Doctor, perhaps. Or a short amount of time between her arrival and finding him again. Then again, she long ago learned that it doesn't really matter what's imagined. Reality tends to defy it as best it can. 

It's been two months since she joined UNIT. She's posted to a satellite office in Cardiff, mostly due to her own insistence. She wants to be close to the Rift because she knows he'll have to return at some point to refuel the TARDIS. Though he's just as likely to arrive in London, she doesn't want to return to her one-time home. London has too many ghosts for her now. It's easier to stay in Cardiff, where she can start somewhat anew. Yet she must be careful thanks to the overwhelming influence Torchwood apparently has in the city.

It'd be simple, easy really, for Torchwood to pluck her off the streets despite her UNIT protection. Even though the constant vigilance is trying, she wouldn't change it for the world. It's giving her the chance to consider some of her actions over the past several years. Both with him and without him.

When she was with his Ninth self, she stood up to him, she challenged him, she wouldn't take his word on anything unless she understood as much as she could. That changed after his regeneration, she knows. She was scared. Terrified, really, that she'd lose him again.

It made her sloppy. It made her childish. It made her clingy. It made her into something she wasn't and that, in turn, rubbed off on him.

She caused what happened, she decides. She caused her own exile. It's only fair that she has to work to get her life back. It's not a bad life after death, really. She's doing what she does best. She's just bound to a single planet, a single time.

God, she misses him.

She misses a lot of things. Things that she's left behind or had leave her. The Doctor. The TARDIS. Her Mum. Her few friends in the other universe. She can't count the number of times that she's asked a question and started when it's someone other than Toshiko who answers. Nor can she count the number of times that she's wanted to ask for Mickey, but realises at the last moment that he's not here. It's not regrets, really, that haunt her mind. It's more the memories.

Here she is, saving the world, only this time it's without anyone that she knows. She suspects that Benton and even the Brigadier – an older woman named Bambera – know that she's looking for the Doctor. She doubts that they'd be surprised if she disappears one day after a sighting of the Time Lord. That has yet to happen.

There've been a few times that she's heard the phrase 'Code Nine' – another sighting of a blue police box appearing somewhere unexpected. However, each time it wasn't him. She's been here long enough to learn about the Doctor's past selves – at least the ones that UNIT's aware of. She's counted ten so far, including the ones she knows. But she knows that she can't contact him. Not when it isn't him, the one she's after. One encounter with the consequences of her meddling with time was more than enough for one lifetime. However, she can't deny that each time she sees him, no matter which 'him' it is, she still feels the same way.

Doesn't matter what he looks like, it's still him. Still her Doctor. Even if he carries a brolly and has shifty eyes. Or if his coat should've got him banned from at least one planet, if not throughout the universe. Doesn't even matter who he's got with him. She thinks at one point she saw a young Sarah Jane running across a CCTV image, chasing after a man with an extra-long scarf. It's still the man she loves.

The one time that she did find him, the one she was looking for, she thought she might faint. She was carrying the shopping back to her flat and there it was. The TARDIS. And there he was. He looked about the same, though his suit had changed. Blue didn't suit him as well as the brown, she decided. However, before she could do more than open her mouth to shout at him, she realised that someone was with him. A dark-skinned woman with a wide, friendly smile joined him and grabbed his hand. The words dried on her lips, and she ducked into a stairwell, where she could watch and not be seen.

Moments later, she watched him walk into the TARDIS, followed closely by the woman.

_Who is she? Where's she from? Does he love her? Does he remember what we had? At least he does have a hand to hold… Oh, god, but it isn't me… _

Her heart ached, but she still said nothing. Even when the dematerialisation started, she said nothing. Even though the TARDIS key that she always kept around her neck burned her, she did nothing. And then he was gone.

She supposes it was cowardice that held her back, but she didn't want to be another Sarah Jane. She didn't want to seem as if she'd been wasting her life waiting for him.

She hasn't. She won't. But she's still waiting. Waiting for a time when he's alone and she can come to him. When she can reveal that she's here, in this universe, and wants to go home.

She tells herself that that day will come. It's not a futile hope. It's not. She just has to wait for the right time (though, in a lifetime of 'right times', she should know that there isn't any such thing).

Running a hand through her hair, she forces herself to concentrate. She really is becoming maudlin in her old age. The corner of her lips twitch into a half-smile at the thought. Right.

Concentrate.

Though it is just her luck that she gets stuck with monitoring readouts while Dr Chesterton's on medical leave. It's rather boring, she thinks. Probably why her mind's drifting off topic. With a sigh, she checks the readings again. For a moment or two, she could've sworn that she saw something spike. Indications, or so she suspects, of Rift activity. But when she scans the previous few minutes'-worth of readings, there's nothing. Not a sign of a spike or anything else. Nothing out of the ordinary.

Which just makes her that much more suspicious.

She's learned that the Rift seems to pride itself on being unpredictable. Readings change, alter, twist and turn and get gnarled somehow. It was the same on the other world. Each time she thought she found another way through, there was nothing. A false hope.

Makes sense that this Rift's just as contrary.

She's about to search for a cup of coffee when the alarms begin to ring, indicating another, far more powerful, spike in the Rift's energy output. It doesn't take long to locate the source and she bites back a curse when she realises just where it is. It'd have to be near the Millennium Centre, wouldn't it? Far too close to Torchwood, if it's the same here as it was back in the other universe. Then again, it could always mean that the Doctor's back.

Shaking her head, she picks up the telephone and calls for a car. She'll grab a few others from the UNIT staff and look into it. And, well, if she disappears during this investigation – provided, of course, that it's the Doctor at the proper time - that'd be okay. Right?

* * *

Her gaze is immediately drawn to the fountain the instant that they arrive, but there is no familiar blue box sitting beneath it. Instead, all she can see are typically oblivious people wandering past them. Admittedly, she does get a few strange looks, but she believes that that's mostly because they've parked in a no-parking zone. 

There's nothing about them to indicate that they're with any sort of government-related organisation. No insignia, no stencils on the car, nothing other than the badges that are hidden within their wallets. Shaking her head and dismissing the pang of disappointment, she pulls out one of the tracking devices from her satchel. According to the readouts, the centre of the disruption is close. Probably a few streets away.

"Peter, Liz, looks like it's down that street," she says, pointing in the appropriate direction. She lets them walk ahead of her, keeping her eyes on the tracker. There's nothing that seems out of the ordinary. At least there isn't anyone screaming or running away from whatever's the source of the problem. Then again, she should probably be worried about that.

Her attention's on the tracker when she realises that someone's behind her. Far, far too close for a random passer-by. No, this is deliberate. She can't reach for her gun, not now. It'd be far too obvious. However, she can't help but tense. She can see Peter and Liz. They're so close but too far away. This is what she's been worried about.

She knows it's Torchwood.

They've found her.

A hand rests upon her shoulder and she tenses further. Perhaps, if she can just get a bit of leverage…even shout for her companions…

"I wouldn't," a very familiar voice says and she feels her heart skip a beat.

It can't be. It can't.

The hand turns her around, and she lets it. Feeling too numb by the familiar voice to say anything or to protest.

Oh, god, it is. It is.

"Hello, Rose," Jack says and she can only gape at him.

She's still numb when he begins to pull her with him, ignoring the nagging feeling that tells her she should still shout, still call for help, if only to let Peter and Liz know what's happening. However, she can't. It's Jack and he's alive and…

"You're alive," she says softly, finally finding her voice as he tugs her away from the others.

A flicker of an unidentifiable emotion crosses his face before it disappears, hidden behind one of his smiles. There's something off about him, she realises. He's different. Harder, somehow. And she's not certain why. "I'm not that easy to kill," he replies dryly, still pulling her with him.

"Jack, wait," she says, trying to pull free of his iron-grip. "I can't. The others'll…"

"UNIT can sod off," he tells her and she winces at the accusation in his voice. He knows, then. Knows that she's a member of UNIT. What if he's…

"You're Torchwood, aren't you?" she asks, feeling as if a lead weight has suddenly appeared in the pit of her stomach.

He doesn't confirm or deny her words. Instead, he continues walking and she has to follow, or risk dislocating her arm in the process. There's something cruel about his grip. This isn't him. Isn't the Jack she knows. Then again, what has he been through since Satellite Five? Hell, she thought he was dead. No matter what lies the Doctor said about him helping sort out the rebuilding of the Earth. That doesn't matter. She knew it was just to make her feel better.

Yet she never asked. Never asked to get him again, never asked to see him again. She never even mentioned him again.

What sort of friend is she, then? Can she really blame Jack for being angry?

"Will you at least tell me what you want?"

He stops suddenly, causing her to run into him. "What do I want?" He repeats her question, a sneer in his voice. "Answers."

She realises that they're standing in front of the fountain now. Same spot, unless she misses her guess, where the TARDIS once stood all those years ago. Jack presses a button on his wrist-computer and she feels, much to her surprise, a rumbling beneath her feet. And then they're descending.

He refuses to answer her questions as they descend into the Hub. Only, this time, it's a different Hub from what she remembers in the other universe. There is a pterodactyl, she sees. But the people are different. No, wait, the same. She finds herself staring at Toshiko, the mirror of the one she knows, in dumbfounded shock.

Realising belatedly that she's being rude, she stops staring, instead looking at Jack. As soon as the lift stops, he drags her with him towards an office – his, she supposes.

"Jack, who's-" she hears Toshiko ask, but Jack says nothing.

He just continues dragging her with him.

"Damnit, Jack, stop," she says, trying to free herself from his grip. "That's enough! Please, you're hurting me."

He releases her at that moment, pushing her into the office and closing the door behind him. Jack takes a few moments to close the blinds, concealing them from his people's – and she thinks he's the boss here – curious looks.

"Why did you leave me behind?" he asks without preamble.

She rubs some feeling back into her wrist as she watches him warily. She suspects that she'll have bruises in the morning, but that doesn't matter. What matters is that she keeps her wits about herself, especially considering that this Jack isn't the one she knows. Can't be. He's far too hard. Far too callous to be him.

"I thought you were dead, Jack," she replies, cursing the break in her voice as she says those words. She'd mourned him, really. Figured the Doctor was lying, but didn't want to press for the truth.

His expression softens somewhat, though he shakes his head. "Then why didn't you return for my body?"

"The Doctor. He was regenerating an' it all went a bit mad," she says. "Told me later it was regeneration sickness. Anything he said, or did, at that time was in question. I thought he was lying to me when he said you were busy rebuildin' the Earth. Thought you were dead. An' I just…didn't want to face it. To see your body…" She turns from him, unable to bear the anger in his face or the betrayal.

"He always hated hurting you," he says softly, almost as if he were talking to himself. "Figures that he'd leave me behind. Then what about Torchwood London, Rose? You were listed as being dead. I saw the CCTV footage. Saw the Doctor leaving alone. So what happened?"

She winces, wrapping her arms around herself. "Oh, I died. Least, that's what they put in the records. Missing in action, I suppose. Got myself flung into an alternate dimension with Mickey an' my Mum. Spent over two years…" She stopped, shaking her head as she turns towards him.

"What happened to you, Jack? Why are you-"

Her words are cut off as he moves into her space, pressing a finger to her lips as he leans towards her. "You want to know?" he asks and she can feel his breath as it touches her lips. "I could tell you. Tell you exactly what happened."

Jack drops his finger from her lips, but not before it traces a path down her cheek to her jawline. "But that's a story-" He brushes a kiss against her lips. "- that I'm saving for the Doctor."

"Jack, I-" she begins, but she's cut off once more as he kisses her again, sliding his tongue into her mouth. She struggles against the kiss at first, pressing her hands against his chest in an attempt to push him away. However, before long, she finds herself kissing him back. Giving in. Almost despite herself.

When the kiss breaks, he smiles against her lips. "It's nice to see you again, Rose, but it's not you that I need. It's the Doctor. And I will have him." Something in the way he says those words send a chill down her spine. As if he means them in a different way than he once would. Before, there would've been flirtations, indications that he'd prefer a threesome of some sort, but not this.

The protest that she's about to make is swiftly quelled as he slowly works at driving her mad. Kisses, licks, nibbles, hands brushing against her body, things that she wanted once from him – though she wants the Doctor more – and she curses herself for her weakness. She can't stop him. Doesn't want to stop him.

He slides her suit jacket off her shoulders, peppering her newly revealed skin with more kisses and licks. "You know," he says, almost conversationally, as he continues touching her. "I thought about this before. Oh, not exactly this, but about what I'd do if I found you again."

Another kiss and he draws a whimper from her and a groan. Her hands aren't idle, touching his skin, helping him disrobe, doing anything and everything she can to prolong this.

She always knew he'd be fantastic at this.

"Oh?" she asks, the sound turning into another moan as he touches her again.

"It'd be so simple. You're already here, after all." He nibbles a trail down the column of her neck as he pushes her towards his desk, swiping it clean of materials before bending her over it. "I could send him a signal, bring him here and offer you in exchange for what I want."

Her blood chills, cooling her desire for this, for him. She knows, at least suspects, that he wouldn't go through with that plan. He wouldn't tell her otherwise. But that he thought of it. That he wants revenge so much that he'd…

He does something with his tongue and her body betrays her. A wash of pleasure-pain overwhelms her, though her mind is still filled with horror. He thought of using her…

"Oh, god, Jack…"

He cuts her off again, kissing her, telling her that it's okay, but it isn't. Oh, god, it isn't, because she's a temptation now. A figurehead for his revenge. Then again, if she lets him do it…it'd get her back to the Doctor…

No.

No. She can't believe she even thought of it. Who's using whom?

Jack's movements press her harder against the desk and she feels him release within her, though her mind's no longer paying attention to his actions. She still cares about him, yes, but he's changed. This isn't her Jack. Not any more.

She misses him. Even though he's right here, above her, she misses him and she forces back the tears.

Later, after they're both cleaned up and re-dressed, he asks her if she'll stay with him. It's too easy to fall into the deception, letting it seem as if she's planning to stay. To let him believe that she'll leave UNIT and join him, though it's a lie. And then, when he's asleep in his bed and she's draped across the couch, she rises.

It takes only a few minutes to write a letter, telling him that this is wrong. She can't stay, much as she wishes she could. He's different now, but so is she. She will not use him just as she won't let him use her. Almost as an afterthought, after her signature, she tells him that she misses him.

Then, just as quickly as he slipped back into her life, she slips out of his.

She just can't deny how much it hurts.

_To be continued..._


	6. Chapter 6: Invasion

**Chapter 6: Invasion**

The city streets are relatively quiet at this time of night. She finds the almost-silence soothing, really, despite the tears that sting at her eyes. Despite the sob that threatens to tear out of her throat. Despite the pain that she feels crushing her.

She doesn't understand what could've happened to Jack to make him this way. That man that she left behind isn't the one she remembers. That Jack wasn't so bitter, wasn't so broken, wasn't so enraged. That Jack didn't want revenge on anyone or anything other than, perhaps, the Time Agency.

She's cold. So cold, even though the night is balmy. She wishes that she could feel warm again, but she knows she can't. She won't. This feeling originates deep inside her. It started when she heard Jack's plan and only grew when her own thoughts turned towards using Jack to get back to the Doctor.

Nothing's right anymore. Not this universe. Not Jack. And, most especially, not her. This isn't who she is. This isn't Rose Tyler, Defender of the Earth. She's become someone else. Someone that she doesn't like.

No, she's not ready to return to the Doctor. Not like this. Not when her compassion has disappeared in the face of Jack's anger. Not when she lets the thought of using Jack cross her mind.

Something tickles her cheek and she brushes her hand against it. It's a surprise when she realises that her fingers are damp. She's crying.

"Shit," she mumbles, fumbling in her satchel for a tissue. She's better than this.

It's almost a relief when the car pulls up next to her, dragging her out of her misery. She turns towards it, blinking when she sees the UNIT insignia on the door. The rear door opens and she's stunned when Colonel Benton steps out of the vehicle.

"Miss Tyler?" he asks and she knows that his keen gaze misses nothing. Not the tear tracks or the way she shivers in the night air. "We were worried. You disappeared and weren't answering your mobile…"

"Yeah, I know," she says softly. "Thought I saw someone I knew, but I was wrong."

"Oh?" Benton asks and she shrugs.

"Told you, I was wrong. Haven't checked my messages. Did Peter and Liz find the source of that disturbance?" she asks, deliberately changing the subject.

He must know what she's trying to do, but he plays along all the same. "Turns out it was a signal generator. Rather advanced. We think it was a trap, actually."

She bites her lower lip. Of course it was. "Hmmm. Wonder who they were after."

Benton's gaze sharpens and she supposes that he's seen straight through her lie. "Rose, are you all right?"

A smile crosses her lips, though there is no true emotion behind it. "I'm always all right. You didn't have to look for me yourself, sir."

"This is purely coincidence. I'm actually on my way home. Would you care for a lift?" he asks and she shakes her head.

"No, thanks. I prefer to walk. 'S a lovely evening," she replies. Is it wrong of her to hope that he catches the hint and leaves? She almost prefers to withdraw into her own thoughts at this moment to replay the events of the past several hours.

"I'll see you tomorrow, then, Miss Tyler. Good evening," he says and returns to the car.

"Good evening," she replies and watches the car leave her behind.

It's a good long walk home from here, but she looks forward to it. It'll give her time to reflect. Time to realise that, for now, she's safe. Jack won't come after her now. She's not the one he wants.

And, most especially, more time to cry.

* * *

Shadows lengthen and shrink as the headlights from a passing car reflect across her ceiling. She should be sleeping. Then again, she should be doing lots of things. She should be back on the TARDIS by now. She should never have let Jack...

No. That's over and done with. Jack's…Jack's made his choice, as has she.

She presses the palm of her hand against her forehead, willing herself to sleep. However, her mind won't still. The events of the past day replay over and over again in her mind. Things she should've done and things that she did. Why does it have to be so hard?

This is her proper universe. She's back home, of sorts, and it seems to be worse than it was in the alternate world. She has UNIT, yes. She has a few friends, but she's not dared make any close friendships given her plans. And now? Now she's found Jack and he's not the Jack she knows.

What if the same has happened to the Doctor? People change. That's inevitable. But what if he's changed so much that he's unrecognisable to her? What if she's changed too much that he doesn't want her? What if she's put him on such a pedestal in her mind – and she knows that that's the problem she had when she was with him before – that the reality'll come as a shock?

"Stop it," she tells herself, turning onto her side and fluffing her pillows. Perhaps the new position will help.

She dreams, sometimes, about her reunion with the Doctor. In some dreams, it's lovely. Everything happens as she's always wanted. A snog, perhaps. Or even just a hug and a warm welcome back into the TARDIS. In others, it's a nightmare. Someone else is with him. He reveals that he didn't want her to come back, that he's moved on. Where he tells her the words that he'd lost the time to say and they weren't 'I love you'.

Those times, she wakes with a gasp, tears in her eyes as she rubs away the memories with the palms of her hands. It's hard, she knows, to be caught between what-ifs and could-bes. He might want her back, might not. Might love her – oh, she knows he does, but not necessarily as she loves him – or might not. Might've moved on and not want to return to what they had.

She tells herself not to worry, but it's a purely human failing. She worries because that defines her. But it still hurts each time she considers those less favourable 'what if' scenarios.

Instead, she firmly pushes those worries aside, focusing upon the here and now, letting the future take care of itself. That's what makes sense to her, at least for now. She'll figure it out when it happens and nothing more.

It just doesn't help when her life isn't turning out as she's expected. Then again, why should it? When she was younger, she never thought that she would end up travelling through time and space with an alien she'd later come to love. Nor would she have thought that she'd end up in a different universe and eventually return to this one thanks to a ghost from her past.

Life doesn't turn out as one expects, and she should know that. Accept it, even. She'll find the Doctor somehow, someway. And, until that happens, she'll make do with what she's got.

A heartfelt sigh escapes her, a sigh that turns into a yawn. She thinks she can sleep now. However, when she closes her eyes, she finds herself staring at the darkness behind her eyelids until her alarm sounds the next morning.

* * *

She stares out the window, watching the thunderclouds build into threatening spirals in the distance. The sun already hides behind clouds, but she knows without a doubt that the approaching storm heralds far more than just rain. It's just a feeling, really. But she's learned over the years to trust those feelings when she can.

They've never led her astray before.

Pulling her suit jacket taut with an automatic gesture, she turns away from the view. Her office is small, but UNIT can't afford the luxuries that Torchwood – either in London or in the other universe – has in abundance. At least she has a new computer, a desk and a space that she can use to shut out the rest of the organisation when the memories get to be too much.

A puff of air from the air conditioning unit sends a few papers onto the floor. She bites back a curse as she bends over to pick them up. She really has been letting her work pile up on her. Before, the air conditioning wouldn't've even stirred the stack of papers. Now, they're balanced precariously enough that the merest jostle would send them to the floor in disarray.

That's one major similarity between Torchwood and UNIT, she thinks. She can never escape the paperwork. Admittedly, given UNIT is a military-run organisation, the paperwork is, if anything, far worse. Everything in triplicate seems to be the company motto.

She misses the days when she didn't have to worry about trivial things like paperwork. She just saved the world and got on with life. Though she has to acknowledge that having the paperwork meant that she does have to deal with the consequences of her actions. Well, both her own and that of her team.

With the Doctor, they tended to swan off and let the locals handle whatever mess they left behind. Now she's one of the 'locals' and she knows how annoying that can be. She makes a mental note to yell at the Doctor the next time she sees him, especially after the mess his multi-coloured coated incarnation left behind. Though that'd have to go after the hug (and possibly the snog).

She's about to sit down and start to address some of her paperwork when she hears a tap on her door. "Come in," she calls, surprised that they didn't bother using the telephone. Generally, when someone wants to talk to her, they call rather than come to her office. She supposes that that's because many of them prefer her to visit them, in the safety of their own surroundings, rather than hers.

She knows that her office seems bare, almost lifeless, but for the few pictures she has of _him_. They're small and one or two are almost too grainy to make out for any but her. She thinks she favours the one picture she has of them – her first Doctor, herself and Jack – from their last visit to Cardiff. It's a grainy CCTV image, but it's more than she had before.

When she was stuck in that other universe, the only reminder she had of him was the TARDIS key around her neck. Here she has images. Though the pictures are silent, the memories that they evoke are more than loud enough for her.

"Miss Tyler?" Sergeant Miller, the Colonel's aide, asks as he steps into her office. "Colonel Benton requests your presence in his office."

She blinks at him. This is rather strange. Usually Benton just calls her, rather than sending someone through the halls of the Cardiff HQ to her office. "I'll be along presently," she says, but Miller doesn't move.

"I'm to escort you, ma'am," he says and that is warning enough. Why would the colonel send someone to escort her? As far as she knows, she's done nothing wrong. A quick glance at Miller's expression reveals that he's nervous. Almost jumpy, really, and that never bodes well.

"All right, lead on," she tells him and follows as he leads her towards Benton's office. The halls are full of personnel – a bustle of activity that's rare at any time, let alone the late morning hours.

Colonel Benton's office is just ahead and she waits for the sergeant to announce her arrival before she lets herself in. "Sir?" she begins, but she stops as soon as she sees that the colonel is on the phone.

"Yes, ma'am. She's right here," Benton says, waving her towards one of the seats arrayed in front of his desk. He pauses for a moment, listening intently. "Of course, ma'am. We'll deploy within the hour." He hangs up the phone and regards her for a long moment, long enough to make her start to feel self-conscious.

"Sir?" she asks, trying to prompt him into revealing the answers to the questions that swirl in her mind. Why was she summoned? What's going on?

Benton smiles, but she knows that it's mostly for her benefit rather than a real expression. Pushing a sheaf of papers towards her, he nods at them for a moment. "Refer to those, Miss Tyler, as I explain why you're here. That was Brigadier Bambera on the phone. We're being mobilised due to a suspected invasion.

"We've lost contact with the Berkely power plant decommissioning group. Generally, this wouldn't be a problem that would attract our attention. However, two hours ago, the Oldbury power plant ceased transmitting information to the British Nuclear Group's headquarters. The last transmission from Oldbury was a very brief phone call that ended with the sound of screams.

Half an hour ago, radar detected three unidentified craft heading towards the Hinkley Point A facility from Oldbury. These are the three closest nuclear power plants in the United Kingdom. We doubt that this is a coincidence. None of the three aircraft have filed flight plans with the appropriate authorities and ours have been unable to catch them. We've been asked by the Prime Minister to investigate."

Taking the papers, she begins to leaf through the information. Oldbury, Berkely and Hinkley Point A are nuclear power plants. Berkely was decommissioned over a decade ago and Hinkley Point A was decommissioned in 2000, but nuclear materials are still present on the site. That doesn't answer why, though.

Sure, she knows that the Slitheen wanted to reduce the Earth to nuclear rubble to sell to the lowest bidder, but these are power plants. Beyond the nuclear materials on-site and the threat of a meltdown that'd irradiate the nearby countryside, she can't see why those facilities would be targeted. "Did our radar detect anything comin' in from space?"

Benton shakes his head. "There was a solar flare that scrambled our satellites eight hours ago. We wouldn't've detected an incoming spacecraft during that time."

Damn. "Where are we getting deployed, then?"

"We're going to Oldbury, Miss Tyler. I need you to prepare your team. We deploy within the hour."

"Yes, sir," she replies as she stands. "We'll be ready. An' Colonel? What about Torchwood?"

It might be her imagination, but she thinks she sees a shadow cross Benton's face. "They shouldn't be a problem."

Hopefully not, but she's learned enough to realise that nothing ever goes as planned.

* * *

The Oldbury power plant is a daunting facility. She scans the facility with her binoculars, lingering over the main building and the twin reactor-cooling towers. Everything looks to be in order. She doesn't see anything that strikes her as obviously alien, but that means nothing. There could be an invisible army outside Oldbury and they'd never see it.

The UNIT convoy is holding a mile out from the power plant, opting to maintain their distance until soldiers can perform a more detailed reconnaissance of the area. The river curls around the plant, a natural barrier that prevents them from truly surrounding the buildings. However, that doesn't seem to daunt the Colonel – or the newly arrived Brigadier.

The other power plants probably have similar convoys, ready to deploy upon the Brigadier's command. It's strange, though. She can't seem to wrap her mind around why anyone would want to take over a power plant. What damage they could cause would be limited, even if all three plants went into some sort of nuclear meltdown.

Unless…

She returns her attention to the cooling towers, eyes narrowing as she focuses on the smoke rising from the top. It might just be her imagination, but isn't the smoke off-colour? Shouldn't it be white or grey and not have that orange-ish tint? Though, it could just be the day. The cloud cover is thick, but enough sunlight peeks through the clouds to add strange hues to the sky.

"Peter," she says, passing the binoculars to him. "Look at the cooling towers. See anythin' that seems off to you?"

He hums under his breath as he looks through the binoculars, a furrow appearing on his forehead as he adjusts the magnifications. "The smoke's wrong," he replies, worry in his voice.

"'S what I thought. Be right back," she says, leaving him and Liz behind as she seeks out Benton and the Brigadier. When she finds them, the two officers are surrounded by an ever-changing group of soldiers. With each passing moment, soldiers disperse – prompted, she thinks, by whatever orders Bambera is giving out – to be replaced by yet others.

She has to force her way through the soldiers, but they are mostly a precaution for the senior officers. It'd be a major loss should anything happen to either of them. When she's acknowledged by the Brigadier, she reports what she's seen. She doesn't know what it means, but she suspects it can't be good.

"Right. Benton, take a team with you and infiltrate the facility. Take Miss Tyler along. I expect you to report back as soon as you're inside with a sit-rep. Understood?" Bambera says, staring at the power plant as if it must hold all the answers she's searching for.

"Sir." Benton nods, signalling for her to follow him. As they walk, the colonel selects a few more men to accompany them, but their group remains small. She knows why, of course. A larger group is easily spotted – not that there's enough cover between here and the facility to offer any measure of protection for a group of any size.

She remains silent as they sneak towards Oldbury's main building. The weight of the gun in her hands is a cold comfort as they move, but there's no guarantee that whatever they encounter will be vulnerable to conventional weapons. She can only hope and that has to be enough.

A hint of something orangish-red catches her attention and she pauses without telling Benton she is doing so. The colour seems just as wrong as the smoke. Here, things should be green or yellow. Not this burnt orange colour. She realises that it's a patch of grass, no more than a foot across. The dim lighting washes out the landscape, but it's enough to tell the truth.

She fingers the blades of grass, wincing when something stings her hand. When she pulls away her hand, she realises that her fingers are tinged with red. The grass cut her.

When she looks up, she realises that the others have moved on, leaving her some distance behind. Pulling a tissue from her pocket, she pulls some of the grass from the soil, using the tissue to protect her fingers. Pocketing the tissue-wrapped grass, she uses another tissue to dab at the blood on her hands and follows them. The grass means something, she thinks. It's wrong somehow. Almost…alien? Yes. Alien.

And the smoke…

She bites her lower lip as she reaches Benton and the others. He's silent when he turns towards her, gaze flicking towards the blood-stained tissue in her hands. What if…?

"There's somethin' off about this place," she tells him in a low-pitched voice, mindful of the possibility of others listening. "Found something a bit odd." She pulls out the tissue-wrapped grass, revealing it carefully, mindful of its sting.

She realises, then, that the grass is moving. Almost as if it's caught by a breeze, but the air is still. It moves around in the tissue, pausing only when it finds a droplet of her blood, caught by the tissue when she first pulled out the bit of grass. She watches in stunned amazement as the blood-red spot disappears.

"Drop it, quickly," Benton orders.

She does, stepping away as the grass and tissue fall to the ground. The grass - though it's not grass, is it? It's something else entirely – continues to move, pulling itself off the tissue. However, as soon as it touches the brown soil beneath it, the grass begins to darken, to shrivel.

In moments, it's not moving. If anything, she'd say it's dead.

"The hell?" one of the soldiers says, keeping a wide berth around the blackened object.

An idea suddenly occurs to her. An idea terrible enough to send chills up her spine. She thinks she knows what this is. The smoke. The blood-eating grass. The invasion. Even, possibly, the use of the power plants.

She's read about this before. In her texts in the other universe. In those science fiction books that Mickey kept trying to convince her to read (didn't matter that reality was far better than fiction). They're trying to make the Earth like their home. The smoke's the catalyst. Changing the atmosphere, the plant-life, even the soil. Making it different. Making it suit them.

"Terraforming," she says. "They're tryin' to terraform this area. Suit their needs. Their planet. An' that –" she points at the orange-coloured smoke rising from the twin towers. "-is how they're doin' it."

Benton's jaw clenches. "Right. Keep moving. The Brigadier needs information, not guesses."

She bites back the response that she wants to make, instead nodding her agreement. Much as she wishes she could flaunt her knowledge, she knows that she can't. There's every possibility that she could be wrong. God, she's sounding like the Doctor. She knows that Bambera isn't one for theories, she's one for facts.

Surprisingly, they reach the main entrance to the Oldbury facility without any resistance. Perhaps, though she knows it's a long shot, the invaders might be gone. They could've just left whatever it was that they wanted to leave behind – terraforming or not – and…

No. She can't see that happening. So their friends are inside.

The colonel uses hand signals to direct her and the others as they slip inside. It's cold inside the building, far colder than she'd expect the area to be kept given the warmth of the day. She refuses to give into the urge to shiver.

Hold on. She can hear something. A sort of clicking sound? She holds up her hand, tapping the side of her ear when Benton looks at her. He nods slightly, cocking his weapon as the others do the same.

The clicking noise is getting closer. Her imagination dreams up a sort of monster, claws clicking against the floor. Perhaps a dinosaur, though the Silurians wouldn't've gone for a power plant as their base of operations. She should know.

Oh, she thinks it must be just around the corner now. The others are as hidden as they can be, though they can't blend in. The camouflage gear and her own business suit are at striking odds with the sterile white of the building. She can only hope that if they stay still, whoever's coming won't bother looking in this direction.

_Something_ steps around the bend. She doesn't move her head, doesn't track it, but she can see it. Oh, god, can she see it. It's green. So vibrantly green and tall. Claw-like hands alternately clench and release in a threatening gesture.

One of the soldiers shifts behind her and she grits her teeth, knowing without a doubt that the alien was going to turn. It'd turn and find them and…

It does. One of its hands aims towards her, a hiss escaping from its mouth. "Intruders," she thinks she hears it say, but why would it be speaking in English? Doesn't make sense, that. Must be her imagination.

"Fire!" Benton orders and she doesn't have enough time to even mentally question his words before the hall fills with the sound of weapons fire.

The claw-like hands are more than that, she realises, as a beam of some sort strikes down one of the soldiers. Bullets strike the creature, careering off to strike walls, causing debris and smoke to fill the air. She can't tell if it's been injured, but she can hear moans of pain from behind her, from beside her. Shouts, screams, fire. It all combines into a mindless cacophony that fills her ears, drowning out everything but the fierce beating of her heart.

She's crouched, trying to keep herself as small a target as possible. Her gun's cartridges have been spent and she fumbles in her pocket for an extra clip. They're losing. It doesn't take a genius to realise, despite the number of men with them, despite Benton, despite herself, the lone alien is beating them.

Oh, god, she wonders if this is how it's supposed to end. Defending her proper Earth without seeing him again.

Then she feels it. Someone's behind her, almost looming over her and she stops her movements, frozen in the midst of the fire-fight, convinced that she's about to...

"Oi! Benton! This way! Run!" a familiar voice commands and there isn't enough time to turn and gape in shock. There's never enough time.

The voice recedes, still shouting for them to run, to flee, to get out while they still can. She can hear Benton calling for a retreat and she launches herself upwards, her feet hitting the floor in a pounding run, chasing after that voice. That oh so familiar voice.

There's a door. Darkness looms behind it, but she doesn't care. He's behind there, he has to be, and she can only follow.

"Doctor!" she can't help but cry out, chasing after what might be a dream.

The door swings shut behind the last of the surviving soldiers, concealing them in blackness, and, just as suddenly, a faint light casts a bluish glow over a face that she knows far too well. A face that's etched in shock as he aims that light – the sonic screwdriver, she identifies – towards her.

"Rose?" he asks incredulously.

_To be continued..._


	7. Chapter 7: Prelude to War

**Chapter 7: Prelude to War**

The Doctor suspects that he's finally lost it. Gone bonkers. Lost his mind. Madness abounds. Admittedly, he's been accused of it before. Only thing is that, this time, he's starting to believe it. How else can he explain seeing Rose Tyler again? Feverish imaginings, perhaps? Weird mould in the air? Sonic screwdriver not working properly, conjuring an image rather than locking the door like he's trying to do?

Did, that is. He hears the click that indicates that door is as nicely secure as he can make it.

But, no, it doesn't matter how many times he blinks, she's still here. Still staring at him in shock. He knows he's gaping, but he supposes he can be excused. It's not every day that he sees someone he thought he lost forever – _I'm so sorry, Rose_ – standing in front of him.

"Doctor?" Benton asks and he finds himself thankful for the distraction.

"Yup! Hello, Benton! Colonel now, too, I see. Brilliant, that. Just brilliant." He grins at the officer and he waves his fingers at him, telling himself that it isn't really an aborted move to reach for Rose. "But, really, not much time to chat, there's..."

"Doctor," Rose says, curbing anything else he might've said. Really, everything that is in his mind just disappears, focusing everything upon her. It really is her. Really is Rose. And it's just like before, isn't it? Only this time without Cybermen and Daleks and pesky Rifts and…

"How?" he manages to say before shaking himself. There'll be time enough to find out how this could've happened later. Not that he's disappointed it's happened, anything but. In fact, he might be thinking about kis…no. No, no, double no. Bad idea. Really, really bad idea. "No, wait. No time for a nice chat. Bit of an Ice Warrior problem here, you see. But later, yeah?"

Oh, he shouldn't, but it's too tempting. She's too tempting. And, well, the Ice Warriors can wait for a few minutes while he indulges himself, right? And she's apparently working with UNIT too, which is brilliant. Everything's brilliant, actually. But he doesn't really care about UNIT at this moment. No, his attention's still focused on her.

She's a bit older he thinks. No more than a couple of years, really, though he can't tell that from her appearance. More from how she holds herself. It's still Rose. His Rose. And she's here. She's bloody here and that's fantastic. "There is, though, time for this," he says and, before he can do more than start to open his arms, she's there, snaking her arms around him, under his trench-coat, squeezing him tightly.

He's close enough now to smell her shampoo – same one, he realises, that she used to use. She feels the same in his arms, just the same, as if years haven't gone by since he's seen her last. He thinks he could spend eternity just holding her, remembering everything that they had and everything that he lost but now regained. "Rose," he begins before cutting himself off again, firmly telling himself that he's not self-conscious when he releases her from his embrace. But he doesn't let her go far, instead entwining their fingers.

It's been so long.

It's brighter, he realises. Seems the soldiers decided to bring their own light to this little party. At least two torches light the area now, revealing that that this is just another hallway. A dark hallway. He can see the barest hint of a door just at the edge of the light and he smiles. Yes. Another corridor. Mysterious, maybe. Damp, sort of. Just the sort of thing that he loves, really.

Just better now that she's here.

"Doctor," Benton says, a measure of reprimand in his voice and something else. Maybe a bit of satisfaction? "What's going on?"

"Oh, that's the difficult part. Well, not difficult. Simple, actually. The Ice Warriors have invaded," he says, feeling the urge – and he blames this on the giddiness he's still feeling over Rose's appearance – to make some sort of sound effect to accompany that proclamation.

"They want to use the nuclear reactor as a catalyst in their plans to terraform, er, well, martian-form your planet. Mars has got a bit chilly for the blokes and they're just looking for a new home. Problem is that this faction doesn't see a problem with pushing you lot aside to do it."

"An' how do we stop them? Seems that conventional weapons don't even dent 'em," Rose says, earning her a startled look. Conventional weapons? Did she just say 'conventional weapons'? Makes him wonder what she's been up to since he's last seen her.

"Oh, the standard shoot 'em up procedure that UNIT's famous for won't work with these aliens. They've got armour. Lots of armour. You've just faced one of their typical soldiers. Just think what a group of that lot can do," he replies.

"Then how are we supposed to stop them?" Benton asks, exasperated.

He grins, lost for a moment in fond recollections of his time with UNIT. "You're not. I am."

"Not alone," Rose says, tightening her grip on his hand. "We've got a stake in this too, Doctor. 'S our planet. Besides, knowing you, you're plannin' on finding the leader and tryin' to prattle him into submission. That won't work an' you're gonna end up captured. Then we're going to have to rescue you. So, can we skip the getting captured part an' get to the part where we save the day?"

He gapes at her. She just… Is she agreeing with him or disagreeing? And how does she know… oh, right. Of course she does. "I wasn't planning," he begins, but curbs himself after he sees her unimpressed look. "Well, maybe I was. A bit. Simplest way to find out what they're up to, besides trying to turn the Earth into a day spa for Ice Warriors, really. Oh, and you got the order wrong, Rose," he tells her.

"I did?" she asks, looking confused.

"The plan's for me to get captured first."

* * *

She suspects that Fate is currently laughing at her. Either that or it's the part of her that had given up hope at ever seeing him again, breaking apart at the reality. She's torn, really. She doesn't want him going into danger, where he might end up regenerating again. This neediness, this fear, frightens her.

This is what happened before, she realises. In the wake of his regeneration, she didn't want to lose him and so became possessive, jealous, claiming him in ways that she had no business doing. Just because she loved him and he loved her doesn't make him her possession. Doesn't give her the right to want to hold onto him, to keep him safe, to never let him out of her sight again.

She shakes herself and that possessiveness disappears, almost as if it never was. She's learned. She can't keep him any more than she can keep a star in the palm of her hand. It's time she stops acting like a lovesick teenager and acts her age.

Question is, though, is this right? Should she even be considering travelling with him after everything that's come before? What's to say that she'll be good for him now? Sure, she's had a few years to think things through, to realise her mistakes, but what's to say that she won't repeat them?

Different guise, same effect? They always were too much of a clique. Mickey saw it, experienced it. Even when he left her for Mme. de Pompadour, they still were a clique. Didn't matter then, but does it matter now?

She's making a difference here, she knows. With UNIT. Proper universe and everything. If she stays with Benton and the others, she'll still see him once in a while. She just won't be able to hurt him and he her. Not like before.

Besides, if he does ask her to come with him again, what's to say it's not because he's pitying her? What's to say that it's not because she has no-one else? No-one other than a time-travelling alien with a blue police box as his home?

He's obviously moved on. Found someone new and is happy with her – and she's not jealous, damnit. She's not. Doesn't she owe it to him to do the same?

God, she really hasn't been thinking this through. Not coming here, not seeing him again, none of this.

And she's not thinking about the problem they've found themselves in. She fists her free hand, letting the nails bite into her skin. Stop it, she tells herself firmly and turns towards him, catching his concerned gaze.

She tries to smile at him, one of her usual smiles, but finds that her lips refuse to turn upwards. Their reunion - what should be a happy time - has been ruined by her regrets and worries.

Not to mention a certain Ice Warrior Invasion.

"What? You're gonna offer yourself up to the Ice Warriors on a silver platter? That's your plan?" she asks.

"Don't have a silver platter," he says with a brief shrug, still looking at her intently. She fights the urge to squirm under his frank gaze, feeling exposed.

"Besides, should give you lot time to move in. Ring up the Brigadier – not Alistair, I'm assuming, but someone else…Bambera? – and bring in the troops. But, as a bit of an insider's tip, aim for their eye-pieces. Only vulnerable bit on them thanks to that armour of theirs."

She's doing it again. Shutting everyone else out but the Doctor. She can't do that. Not here, not now. She's got responsibilities.

It's about time she lives up to them.

"Sir?" she asks, deferring to Benton and attempting to ignore the Doctor's amazed expression.

"I don't like it, Doctor. But you somehow manage to muddle-"

"Oi!" the Doctor protests. "I never muddle."

"-your way through. I'll contact Brigadier Bambera," he says, signalling for one of the surviving soldiers to bring the radio to him.

The colonel steps away from them, speaking earnestly into the radio. He only pauses to listen to the response, though she can't hear it. She suspects that she knows what the response will be, though. If Bambera's anything, it's efficient.

They'll come.

"Rose?" the Doctor asks, pulling her attention away from Benton. "I'll have to go in a few minutes, but… are you all right?"

She can't help the automatic response. "I'm always all right." She doesn't miss his flinch or the guilt that rises within her at that reaction. She's completely daft. "Sorry, 's just… I'm not used to this any more." No, that's a lie. She's still used to it. Far, far too much.

If holding his hand is a bit like coming home, what's it going to be like when she has to finally choose? To stay or to go? Then again, she's never considered herself a coward.

"Not used to danger? Running for your life with your best mate at your side?" he asks her in disbelief, though she can see laughter in his eyes. "Impossible. I can't see you sitting still, eating your beans on toast, and letting everyone else have all the fun."

The sudden tightness, almost a stretching feeling, she senses on her cheeks makes her realise that she's smiling. The first real smile she's had all day. "Nothing's impossible," she tells him, feeling a pang shoot through her at her words. She really has become like him, hasn't she?

"No," he replies softly, his earlier humour replaced with another emotion too nebulous for her to identify. "You're here, after all."

She's not sure how to respond, feeling cut off from the world around them. The Ice Warriors, Benton, the soldiers, they don't matter. There's just the Doctor and herself. Sealed together by the strength of his gaze. She feels as if all her fears, her doubts, her worries have been laid bare before him. But, amazingly, he doesn't seem to mind. That ephemeral emotion still swirls in his dark eyes and she thinks that she might be able to identify it.

Just a few moments more… And their stare is broken by the sound of Benton clearing his throat.

"Bambera's giving the order, Doctor," the colonel says.

The Doctor nods, sparing her another glance. "Then I best be off. Things to do, aliens to torment and the like. Rose-" Using their entwined hands, he pulls her into a brief, yet intense, embrace. "-be careful. I…" His voice tapers off as he releases her.

"You too," she says and watches intently as he walks away.

"We'll give him ten before we move out," Benton says, not giving her enough time to start to worry. It's better that way and she gives him her thanks in the form of a nod.

Before she can say, or even do, anything, the floor trembles beneath her feet. It's not enough to make her lose her footing, but it is enough to capture her attention.

When it hits again, she looks towards the door. The door that's shuddering in sympathetic echoes with the tremors.

It hits again and she realises that something's striking the door.

The framework of the doorway splinters slightly, cracking against the strain of each impact.

"I don't think we have ten minutes," she says grimly.

* * *

He's finding it rather hard to think. No, that's not exactly right. It's more that he's finding it hard to think about anything other than what he's just left behind. Stupid, actually. Could get him killed. And he's just managing to get used to this body. Rather annoying if he has to switch now. Find Rose, regenerate.

Bad idea.

There's a choice ahead of him. Metaphorically and literally. The hallway ends a few feet ahead of him, cut off by a door plastered with yellow hazard signs. Another door is just beside him, covered with nothing more menacing than the remains of a colourful sticker.

"Choices, choices, choices," he mutters, tapping his chin absently with a finger. Straight or to the side. Left or right. Eeenie, meenie…

"Right." He decides. Never let it be said that he doesn't have a method of choosing his path. He likes the letter 'R'.

He opens the door and stops, staring upwards at the looming figure of the Ice Warrior. "Oh, hello! Fancy meeting you here. Just realised, actually. This has got to be the perfect time to say it. Always wanted to, you know. Take me to your leader?"

The Ice Warrior says nothing, instead stepping aside and gesturing with his sonic blaster – clever blokes to hide their weapons in their armour – for him to move.

"Rather talkative sort, aren't you? Have a name? I'm the Doctor, by the way." That got a response.

The alien hisses, pushing him forward. "Doc-tor," it – he? – says, its voice sibilant in the thicker atmosphere of Earth. "You should not be here."

"Never let that stop me before," he replies. "Why should it stop me now?"

"You should not interfere," the alien advises him, pushing him down another hallway. What is it with humans and their hallways, anyway? Why can't they just have a… Right. Not helping.

"I'm not the one interfering with Earth, Bob – mind if I call you Bob? Bit hard to call you anything else since you didn't tell me your name. That'd be you. Well, you and your Ice Warrior friends. Changing the environment to suit your needs? Not very neighbourly of you," he chides.

The newly christened Bob doesn't respond, instead forcing him to move faster. Pity, really. He hoped for a battle of wits. Then again, he should know better. Ice Warriors – at least Ice Warriors of this time period – aren't well known for their silver tongues and sense of humour. More interested in honour and survival, really. Though he thinks it must've taken a lot of hedging to turn this invasion into something even semi-honourable.

"Or honourable, come to think of it," he adds, mentally congratulating himself when he hears Bob miss a step as they walk.

Still the Ice Warrior says nothing, leaving him to find other amusements for himself. So he looks around the hallway. It's long, white, lined with doors and not particularly note-worthy, but the pipes add a homely touch. Or maybe that's just him.

He's shoved suddenly, violently towards the double-doors on the left side of the corridor. There's barely enough time to register the words scrawled in English and Welsh of 'CONTROL ROOM' before he's inside.

Blinking lights, humming computers, frightened technicians and towering aliens. Just what every nuclear power plant needs. He grins at the tallest of the three Ice Warriors inside the room, identifying him as their leader by his smoother, more supple armour. Ease of movement is the key, after all. "Hello! I'm the Doctor."

"You should not be here," the leader says dismissively.

"Everyone's saying that. Why's everyone saying that?" he asks. "Besides, I'm not the only one, if we're going that route. You should be back on Mars, enjoying the red dust and chilly days and nights. Not here. And most especially not inside a nuclear power plant."

"And you should be dead," the Ice Lord says.

He tells himself that he doesn't flinch. In some ways, that's absolutely correct. In others, far from the truth. "Rumours of my death are highly exaggerated," he replies.

"The sky and time all burned. We, who were but on the fringes of your people's war, know. You should not even exist. You have no right to judge us, Time Lord."

"Don't I?" he asks as anger begins a slow burn within him. "You know about the war. You know the cost my people paid. And what do you do? You lot decide to take over the Earth. No-one will care, after all. It's just a tiny little planet, no-one'll miss it when it becomes New Mars. Nope. Sorry. Can't do that. See, I'm rather fond of this little world and of its people."

"And you would condemn us to death? To scrape a meagre existence on our homeworld all because you say it should be so? You are no god to make demands of us, Doctor. This is our right," the leader growls, his soft voice at odds with the threat in his voice.

"And you would condemn humanity to death because you can't accept that your time's over?" His anger is evident in his voice, in his stance. Stupid, stupid aliens. Don't they know that, in time, they become some of humanity's greatest allies? Don't they know that this isn't the way?

"We would have what is our right," the leader corrects him.

"No," he replies. "No, you won't. This is your only chance. To make things right and go home. Let these people go. Stop your environmental modifications. Return to Mars."

The alien gestures minutely at the others and, suddenly, he's held in a strong grasp. For a moment, he actually forgot about Bob. "No. You… Ah. Clever, Doctor." The leader turns and selects a button on the console, pressing gently with his clawed hand.

A screen lights up on the wall, populated with internal CCTV footage. When he sees Rose, he has to fight against revealing that he knows her. Then the camera shifts, revealing the exterior.

Good old UNIT. Good old Bambera. Oldbury is surrounded. He can see that there's at least two breach points as the camera pans around the area. Soldiers are already pouring into the complex.

"You were sent as a distraction." It's not a question, but he treats it as one anyway.

"Yup," he says, grinning. "Brilliant that, no? Thought of it myself."

"Pity," the alien tells him, raising another claw to strike a device set on the console. A high-pitched whine fills the air.

Oh. Oh, no. He knows that sound.

It's the sound of a transmat beam. A rather powerful one. And he sees, on the CCTV images, Ice Warriors appearing in flashes of light.

The camera shifts again, back to Rose and Benton.

He doesn't think they notice the Ice Warrior behind them. They're watching a door, fingering their weapons. No-one turns.

His hearts leap into his throat as the Warrior lifts its arm.

The only direction that the weapons fire can go is obvious. Completely and absolutely obvious.

It's aiming for Rose.

"No!" he shouts as the alien on the screen fires.

The camera view shifts again and all he can see is carnage.

_To be continued..._


	8. Chapter 8: Boom

**Chapter 8: Boom**

Strange thing about sonic weapons. Seconds before they strike, there's a change in air pressure. Minute, maybe, but enough for someone who's trained to recognise the danger to know when to duck. That's a legacy she has from Jack. He told her, once upon a time – or, perhaps, once upon a TARDIS – what to expect from weapons from the future. She couldn't let herself react as if she were dealing with contemporary weapons, he warned her. She had to learn, and that knowledge became ingrained within her. The instant that Rose feels that tell-tale sign - a slight breeze against her neck - she's dodging instinctively.

She can feel the blast of energy pass harmlessly over her head, catching a few strands of her hair on its way. She's rolling now, listening to the shouts of the others as she frees her gun and pulls herself into a crouch in one smooth movement.

An Ice Warrior. Another one. Ah, yes, that would make sense. She thought she heard something a few moments before, a sharp noise, something familiar.

Transmat.

Bloody hell. That's not good.

"Fire!" Benton orders and she and others do so, aiming for the eye-pieces. There isn't any cover here. Not to the side, not behind them. The door's still shuddering, splintering and she suspects that it'll collapse at any moment.

The aliens have them surrounded.

One of the men is keeping his attention on the door so she focuses on the Ice Warrior that tried to shoot her. She's trying to aim for the red glass eye-piece of it's helm, however her aim is generally disrupted thanks to the need to duck or dodge every few seconds. The alien's shooting wildly now. Not aiming for a single target, but rather the lot of them.

Intelligent as that tactic is, the Ice Warrior can't be everywhere. Can't shoot everyone. She hears a grunt of pain off to her side and knows that another of their group is down. That makes it, at her last mental count, four of them against one Ice Warrior.

Fantastic. Considering how their last encounter went, she doubts this'll be much different. One Ice Warrior is more than a match for four of them. It's a good thing she loves beating the odds. There's another grunt, and another soldier falls silent. Benton curses under his breath as he fumbles for more ammunition, which means it's up to her and the last soldier.

Last count she has two bullets left in this clip. Two chances only. Biting her lip, she stops dodging, sacrificing safety for accuracy.

Two chances.

She squeezes the trigger, the gun kicking back in her hand. It ricochets harmlessly off the alien's helmet.

There isn't enough time to even curse her luck. She has to try again. The Ice Warrior is aiming for her now.

_No time, no time, no time._ Her heartbeat seems to beat in time with the mental chant. She aims again and squeezes the trigger as the sonic blast shoots towards her. She's diving a second later, gun empty, praying that she's succeeded.

She hits the ground at the same time as she hears something crack. Whether it's the door behind her, the alien's eye-piece, or some part of her anatomy, she can't tell. Over the roaring of blood in her head, the ache in her shoulder and the hard release of air from her lungs, everything's muted.

Benton's at her side in seconds, his brow furrowed in concern. "Are you hit?" he asks and she shakes her head.

"Jus' bruised," she says, blinking a little to order her vision. Just behind him, she can see the fallen Ice Warrior, his eye-piece cracked in two.

"Crack shot," he tells her, offering her a compliment as he pulls her to her feet.

"Thank you, sir," she says, not liking that she's had to use her weapon. It's never been her favoured method of dealing with aliens, really. It's more of a last resort, but in the case of her or them, she'll fire.

She just hates being the cause of –

_Her Dad – from this universe - saved from a hit-and-run._

_A church, consumed. A world, dead._

_The Doctor, dead._

_Her father, run over by a car, over and over again._

_Her fault, her fault, her fault…_

- someone's death.

She takes a moment to register that, besides Benton, only one other soldier made it. The Ice Warriors do have a lot to answer for.

Benton smiles tightly, glancing back at the shuddering door behind them. "The Doctor's had long enough. Salvage what you can. That door isn't going to hold much longer."

She murmurs apologies as she relieves one of the dead soldiers of his remaining weapons clips, slipping them into her pocket. God, she hates this.

"Ready?" Benton asks, glancing at her and the other soldier. He's a sergeant, she realises. Sergeant McMillion. Oh, no. She didn't even bother to find out the names of the others, the soldiers lying dead at her feet. What does that make her?

She nods, following along behind the two as they move down the hallway. Her mind's awhirl with thoughts and considerations, only half-paying attention to where she's going. She knows that if something happens, she'll be a liability, but she needs to think.

The Ice Warriors have transmat technology. That much is obvious. Useful means of moving troops, that. Especially when they're being attacked by UNIT's finest. She thinks, no, knows, the reason why they employed that particular trick now.

The Doctor.

Biting her lower lip, she forces herself to concentrate. There's got to be something she can do to help. There are only three of them. Facing an unknown number of Ice Warriors in their attempt to rescue the Doctor isn't something she fancies. She can't count on her luck holding out if they face even one more Ice Warrior.

They've got to even the odds.

But how?

* * *

White-hot fury fills him as he whirls towards the Ice Lord. It's easier, far, far easier, to be angry than to let the despair take hold. Rose is dead. After everything she's done, after coming back to him, he's lost her.

And it's all this Ice Lord's fault.

"I warned you," he says, his tone deceptively calm, though inside he's screaming. "I warned you and you didn't listen. I warned you to leave this world. I told you to pack your bags and swan off back to Mars, to play your little war games elsewhere. But do you listen?"

Bob's claws clench tighter, shooting pain through his arms, but he doesn't care. Not one tiny bit. He's too busy glaring at the Ice Lord.

"You are no threat," the Ice Lord scoffs, turning away from him dismissively.

He laughs mockingly. "Oh, so many people have said that to me before. So, so many. And you know what? They're all gone. Defeated. Kaput. No more. You're just the latest in a long, long line of stupid aliens with delusions of grandeur."

The alien's body language is somewhat hard to read, but he knows that he's managed to anger him. Good. He prefers it when his enemy is angry. Makes it so much easier for them to fall into one of his carefully crafted traps. Especially this one.

The Ice Lord activates the device on the counter again and he can now hear sound. Screams, weapons-fire, blasts, explosions. Every sound of human and alien warfare he can think of is pumped into the control room. It's overpowering, really, but he doesn't let it affect him. Oh, no, it can't. Because this is exactly what he wants.

"That, Doctor, is the sound of your friends dying."

He tells himself that he doesn't flinch. _Rose… _

A smile stretches his lips as he looks at the Ice Lord. He can only hope that that radio link is two-way. He can't touch his sonic screwdriver. Can't activate it otherwise. So he just has to believe.

_I believe in Rose…_

What should he believe in now? Fate? Hope? Life? The universe? Himself? Oh, definitely not. Too many people have died believing in him. He's the Lonely God, after all. Rubbish to that, really.

Maybe he'll just believe in nothing. Nothing's never failed him before, after all. Not like everything else.

So, to nothing it is.

"No. That's the sound of my friends surviving. Breathing, in and out. Hearts beating. Adrenalin pumping through their veins. Ducking and dodging and fighting and living. That's one of their greatest strengths, these humans. Give them impossible odds and they thumb their noses at it. They do the impossible simply because they can. Not like you lot. Oh, no. See a planet close to your own? Oh, doesn't matter if it's inhabited. It's yours now. Never mind how you squandered your own world."

He wishes that he could move. This speech would be so much better if he could pace, but Bob's not giving him any leeway. Best he can do is level a steady glare at the subject of his rant.

"But there's a problem, isn't there? It's, what, about _60_ degrees hotter here than back home? Hard for you to move about out there, isn't it? Oh, sure, you're trying. Got a few patches here and there of Martian life, but it isn't enough. That's why you've got it so cold in here. Closest you can get to Mars in temperature. Not with that faulty armour of yours. Didn't think to check your _cooling devices_ when you got here, did you? You can practically _melt_ here. Even though it's what humans consider chilly outside, it's still sweltering to you lot, isn't it? I think you'll find that humans aren't such _tower_-ing idiots as you might think."

"Maybe you are correct. Maybe not. It doesn't matter now," the alien says.

He smiles, a skin-stretching smile that will never reach his eyes. He doesn't let himself think, worry, wonder about the soldiers outside. Doesn't let himself fret that his message isn't heard or understood. Doesn't give in to the ever-mounting despair that clutches at his chest.

This is the time, he thinks, where his companion would come in and save the day. An Ace or a Leela or a Martha Jones or a Rose Tyler will rush through those doors…

But there's no-one. Martha's gone, along with all those who came before her. He's alone. Even though Rose came back, she's dead and he's alone. Sometimes he hates his life. Sometimes he loves it. He can never get over the duality of his nature, he knows.

He's living and he's dying at the same time. He's smiling and he's crying, though only the smile wins the war for expression. "Everything matters," he corrects the Ice Lord.

"You don't," the alien says and there's scorn in those words.

He doesn't react. He knows his place in the universe. He's been labelled before. The Oncoming Storm. Ka Faraq Gatri. Time's Champion.

_My Doctor…_

But to say that he doesn't matter? He can't help the small, mocking laugh that escapes him. So this is what insanity is like.

"Kill him," the Ice Lord says.

That, he knows, would be a blessing.

* * *

This is war.

Blood, death and screams. The aching agony of one's own inability to save even just one person. Knowing, without a doubt, that there is no guarantee that she'll survive. No promise of a brighter tomorrow. There's only here and now and the weight of a gun in her hands.

There's Benton, face pale as he nurses a wound in his shoulder. There's what's left of McMillion, crumpled on the floor, his internal organs destroyed thanks to a precise sonic blast and the unforgiving flames of a grenade. And there's the latest Ice Warrior, buried beneath the remains of a wall.

She blinks back the sting of tears, forcing herself to focus on the task before them. Bullets are a scarce commodity now. Only one clip remains between herself and the colonel. They won't survive another attack. It's not fatalism, really. It's only a simple realisation.

Once, a long time ago, that would've frightened her. Now all she feels is sadness that she's come so far only to have it all taken away by an alien invasion. This isn't how her reunion with the Doctor was supposed to go. However, she has to take what she's got.

"Are you all right?" Benton asks, straightening stiffly. His arm is caked in blood, but he waves off her attempt to help.

"I'm fine. Didn't even get grazed," she says grimly. Why wasn't she hurt? Karma should've got her by now, at least.

"Good," he replies, picking his way over the rubble. It was a grenade that caused this destruction. McMillion went down pulling out the pin, screaming for them to run. There are only two of those grenades left. One for Benton, one for her. They can't even call for reinforcements - not since the radio was destroyed along with McMillion.

God, it isn't supposed to end like this.

She pauses suddenly, convinced that she's heard his voice. There it is again, grainy and static-y, but there.

"Mi-" Benton begins, but she holds up a hand, not caring for protocol. She's straining her ears, listening intently.

_…about 60 degrees hotter here than back home? … check your cooling … melt … humans aren't such tower-ing idiots as you might think._

There. A speaker grill, stubbornly maintaining its precarious perch against the only bit of wall remaining on the left side of the corridor. That's where the voice is coming from. And she knows what he means. What he wants her to do. She doesn't take the time to analyse the emotions she thinks she can hear buried beneath that voice.

"That's it," she says, turning towards the colonel, a wide grin across her face. "Martians. Jus' like the Jagrafess, really. Jus' less with the sharp-pointy teeth and blob-like nature. Can't stand the heat."

Benton looks at her blankly, obviously confused.

"Mars 's colder than Earth," she explains, still grinning. "'S why they're trying to modify the environment. Make it cold enough for their lot to survive. We need to get to the cooling towers. I think that their machinery's there. An', if we destroy those devices, things'll start to heat up around here."

The colonel nods. "Then we've got to go."

They run through the hallways of Oldbury, following signs that direct them towards the cooling towers. It's a miracle, really, that no-one tries to stop them. Then again, this section of the plant is suspiciously empty. The sounds of fighting, projected over the speakers, seems muted somehow. Almost hushed.

Oldbury is slowly getting cleared of nuclear material, she remembers. There shouldn't be enough of it to cause a nuclear melt-down. However, there is enough remaining radioactivity to mean that she shouldn't walk into any portion of the cooling towers or the cooling pools without some sort of protection.

There. The cooling towers. From what she remembers from her courses, steam is released within the towers, pulling away heat from the nuclear materials. She supposes that the Ice Warriors must've modified it somehow. To make it draw away heat from the interior of the facility in conjunction with the air conditioning. Perhaps they're using that steam to power their equipment?

She can think about that later.

There's a door just ahead of them, plastered with caution signs and radiation symbols. Through the tiny window, she can see the blinking lights of what can only be alien machinery. She doesn't know how they managed to get it in there, let alone work on it, but perhaps it came already assembled.

She's got to get in there.

"Sir, I need one of those grenades," she says. Perhaps, if she throws one in there and if it lands near the equipment, it'll destroy it. The thickness of the concrete and the sturdiness of the door should (hopefully) contain the blast.

No, wait. They have to split up. Two cooling towers. Two machines. Same coloured smoke rising from both.

"We've got to split up," Benton says, a step ahead of her. "Facilities like this have two cooling towers. Wouldn't make sense to just have one machine." He hands her a grenade and runs down the hallway, following the signs to the other cooling tower, before she can say another word.

"Right," she tells herself. It's time. She doesn't let herself think of the radiation as she opens the heavy door, grunting with the effort. It's going to be tough to close it again after she pulls the pin on the grenade.

Best she doesn't think about it.

The pin releases from the grenade with a soft snick. The grenade is tossed in the general direction of the blinking lights of the alien machine and now she's pushing, shoving, struggling. Hoping and praying that she'll get the door closed in time. Inch by inch, it seems to edge closed at a snail's crawl. Any second now, she should hear a blast. Any second now, she should be thrown away from the door, contaminated with radioactive debris. Any second now…

The door rams home with a loud thud. There isn't enough time to run before she hears the grenade explode…

And everything goes white.

* * *

So ends the last Time Lord. It's a terrible epitaph to an otherwise interesting life, he thinks. However, he has to admit that he's tired. Despite all that he's leaving behind, he can't help but consider all that he's lost. Gallifrey. Friends. Family. Rose.

Maybe this is meant to be how it all finishes. Here, on Earth, defending the last planet that he can call a home. Here, bound by a zealous alien intent on invasion. At least it's a good death, if any death can be called that.

Perhaps this, too, is how the universe repays him. He's lost so much. What's his life in comparison? Karma was bound to catch him sooner or later.

It's just a mite sooner than he thought.

Wait. There. There's something…

Yes. A faint tremor. He can barely feel it rumble through the concrete, but it's there. Oh, yes, he recognises it for what it is – the aftershocks of an explosion. Sure, there've been explosions before, but this one? Coming so close on the heels of his speech? Brilliant! UNIT did hear him. At least, he hopes that's UNIT. Must be them. Yes. Must be.

A far stronger earthquake causes cups to rattle off the console, spilling stale coffee in a spreading brown stain on the otherwise white floor. Alarms begin to sound, setting up a harsh counter-point to the sounds of the gunfight on the speakers. The din is only increased when the aliens and technicians start shouting, exclaiming in fear and confusion.

He's silent, calm. In a way, he feels as if he's nothing more than the eye of the storm. Only bit of order in this chaos.

Apt thought, really.

The alarms and the speakers are silenced seconds later, the quiet deafening in contrast.  
"What have you done?" the Ice Lord asks, whirling on him.

Bob's claws still grip his arms, he still can't move, so he settles for a wry smile. "Me? Absolutely nothing."

The Ice Lord stalks forward, looming over him in what can only be an attempt at intimidation. He barely stops himself from laughing, though a smile does escape his control. "Liar," the alien snarls.

"Ever been told your technique needs a little bit of work? If you want to be intimidating, try harder. It's rather pathetic, really," he chides, sniffing a little as he looks up at the armoured alien.

Instead of a reply, he hears a long, drawn-out hiss of discomfort. He's confused for a moment before he realises that it's getting warmer. Worst thing possible for an Ice Warrior, really. Get too warm, and the poor blokes melt.

The explosions must've channelled some of the escaping heat into the interior of the building. One nice, gigantic pulse of hot air is probably forcing its way through the ventilation ducts right now, forcing warming air in front of it. "Oh, getting too hot for you?" he asks.

Bob releases him, but he refuses to rub feeling back into his arms. Instead, he watches them as more warm air pulses into the room, the smallest herald of what's to come. It's not much, that pulse. Only about an extra ten degrees warmer than they've been keeping this place, but it's more than enough to fulfil its purpose.

He hears the door open behind him and someone – Benton, he recognises – shouting for the Ice Warriors to yield. For the briefest of moments, he allows a measure of hope to fill him, hoping that Rose is still alive. However, Benton is alone.

The Ice Lord turns towards the console and he knows what the alien is after. The device, a transmat. They're going to escape.

That he can't allow. With his newfound freedom of movement, he pushes himself past the Ice Lord and grabs the device, holding it outside of the Martian's reach. The air is getting steadily warmer and he can tell that the Ice Warriors are in pain. Once, a long time ago, he would've had mercy. Would've let them have their escape after this defeat.

Not any more.

"This is how it ends, Ice Lord," he says, watching dispassionately as the Ice Lord's legs buckle.

"No. This isn't honoura-"

"Honourable?" he scoffs. "You lost that right when you invaded the Earth. Let this be a lesson to you."

"We will die…"

"Then-" 'Die', he's about to say, but his words are arrested the second he hears – no, feels – her enter the room.

"Stop, Doctor," Rose says softly. "There's been enough killin' today."

_To be continued..._


	9. Chapter 9: Ramifications

**Chapter 9: Ramifications**

She's never been afraid of him. Even at the times when he was at his worst, she never felt fear. He wouldn't hurt her. Unintentionally, perhaps, but never deliberately. No, she's never been scared of him.

She's scared for him.

When she first sees him, seconds after running into the control room with her weapon drawn, she doesn't like what she sees reflected in his eyes. There is none of the compassion, the humour, the life and love that fuels him. Instead, all she can see is darkness. Darkness like nothing she's ever seen before, even when he was fighting the Daleks.

She's seen aspects of his current expression before. Taunting the Daleks, facing his enemies, facing anyone who's hurt or harmed others (though, most especially, herself). The rest, though, no. She's never seen this before.

He's falling. So far, so fast. Farther than she's ever seen him go. Falling into darkness. Falling into that aspect of his personality that she's only seen glimpses of. The manipulator. The darkness. The final authority, or so he believes, as defined by his own morals and thoughts.

She doesn't like what she sees and knows, now, what he truly needs his companions for. He needs someone to tell him to stop. To tell him no.

Anything to stop that fall.

"Stop, Doctor," she says softly, echoing her earlier thoughts. "There's been enough killin' today."

There's a pause and it seems to stretch towards infinity as he slowly turns towards her. There's disbelief in his expression that's warring with bone-crushing relief and joy. He thought she was dead.

God, is this what she means to him? Without her… no. That's not right. He's moved on. Has someone else to hold his hand. Though where is she? Where's the dark-skinned girl or any of the others that he must've had with him?

He shouldn't be alone. That's one thing she wishes she had said on that beach. Had told him. Anything to keep that loneliness at bay.

"They-" he begins and she stops him with the briefest shake of her head.

"I know," she says, mentally filling in what he was about to say. Yes, the Ice Warriors did terrible things, but they're defeated now. It's over. The killing has to stop. The murder has to stop. And she can't let him continue. "It's finished."

He breathes out a sigh, staring at the alien at his feet. "Go home, Ice Lord. Return to your planet of red dust and chill and remember what's happened. A word of advice. Never underestimate humans, especially when their world's at stake. They always manage to surprise you. Just keep that in mind the next time you even consider trying this again. This world?" The Doctor's lips stretch into a smile. "It's defended."

His fingers brush against the device in his hands and the sound of a transmat fills the room, sweeping the Ice Warriors away.

It's over.

God. She feels herself relax for what feels like the first time in years. However, before she can do more than take a step towards him, the technicians are in the way. Babbling, screaming, crying and, in general, making a nuisance of themselves.

So she listens to them. Tries to calm them, though all she wants to do is talk to the Doctor in private. The technicians are grateful for the rescue, but one of them – identified as the manager - is starting to ask about repayment for the damage their weaponry has caused to Oldbury. She gets the feeling that the man has convinced himself that the Ice Warriors were nothing more than a terrorist group.

Humans.

Shaking her head, she points the manager towards Benton. Let her boss handle him, she thinks. She has more important things to do. She's about to make her apologies to the rest of the technicians when she feels a hand on her arm.

"She's busy," the Doctor says tersely, extracting her gently from the others. This is part of the reason that he hates lingering after one of their adventures, she knows. The aftermath. The ramifications of events. Admittedly, he wasn't the one who blew up the interior of a cooling tower or toppled a wall, but the concept was the same. It's easier to swan off and let someone else take care of it.

Sadly, she can't do that. Yet she wants to talk to him, to be with him in a situation that isn't rife with fear or terror. She thinks Benton'll understand if she does, but she glances towards him all the same. She's got responsibilities now.

Benton spares her a glance, looking over the head of the belligerent manager. It's barely visible, but it's there. A nod. Permission to go requested and granted.

Keeping his hand on her arm (she ignores how her skin tingles where he touches her), he steers her past the technicians and towards the doorway opposite to the one she came through minutes earlier. The door itself is labelled simply 'storage', but that doesn't seem to bother the Doctor as he opens it and gestures for her to go through.

Inside, she blinks as her eyes adjust to the relative gloom of the room. A flickering light bulb causes shadows to alternately lengthen and shrink. Empty radiation suits line the walls, a ghostly audience to their reunion. She's about to fill the silence with words, about to speak, but he beats her to it.

His hand moves from her arm, tracing a path upwards to finally rest against her cheek. Thanks to the lack of proper lighting, his eyes are left in shadow. "How?" he asks, repeating the first question he asked her earlier that day.

"Caught a lift," she replies, unable to prevent herself from leaning into his touch. It's been so long.

No. She has to focus. There's more to this than just her wishes, her desires, her wants. There's his as well. What's good for him. What he needs.

And, if that's not her, so be it.

Before he can do more than frame the inevitable question, she continues, "From someone you might know. Rather intimately, I'd say. Only thing is, you don't remember."

"I don't-" he begins before stopping himself, staring at her with what seems to be disbelief and growing comprehension. "From me? But how?"

A blush creeps over her cheeks and she forces herself not to duck her head. "It was me. Well, Torchwood. From the other universe. We…well, there was this, oh, what did you call it? Telaxian power generator? Somethin' like that. An' it pulled the TARDIS, you, an' a younger version of me, through the Void."

He blanches and she can feel his hand tremble against her cheek. "The paradox…"

"Yeah. Was a bit of a problem, that. You kept the younger me out of the way while we fixed the generator for a return trip. An' you, well, you asked if I wanted a lift." She boldly meets his gaze, knowing what he's about to ask. "I said yes. I don't regret it, though. I miss my Mum an' Mickey an' Pete an' my brother, but that's okay. I didn't belong there."

"Rose, you-"

She cuts him off before he can say anything else. "I didn't. This is my world. My universe. Everyone else, they had someone to replace. I had no-one. Nothing. I was…jus' there. Sure, I helped Torchwood. Saved the world once or twice. Negotiated a treaty with aliens at least three times. Did that for two years. But it wasn't the same. I had my Mum and Mickey but…" _I didn't have you_, her mind helpfully supplies. She tells herself that that isn't the only reason why she chose to exile herself from them. "It wasn't the same."

"And here you are. Doing the same thing. Defending the Earth," he says quietly, amazement colouring his words.

"Not the same," she says, denying his words. "Better. This is home."

"What about Jackie? Mickey? Pete?" he asks and she knows he needs to hear her answer. "Your brother?"

"They're my family," she replies. "But I grew up. An', well, being with them wasn't where I belonged."

A thousand silent conversations pass between them as he seems to digest her words. "How long have you been back?" he asks finally, and she can hear a measure of sadness in his words. Whether he's mourning her family or that she hadn't contacted him earlier, she doesn't know.

"'Bout two months or so," she says softly. They were the longest two months of her life, really. Re-adjusting, discovering her place in a universe that considered her dead and working at UNIT haven't given her the chance to do more than survive.

Then again, she's good at that.

"Why didn't you try to find me sooner?" he asks and in his words she recognises the sorrow for what it is. He thinks she didn't want to find him.

"I…" Now all her reasons, her rationale, seem silly, childish and petty. "Every time I heard that there was a sighting…I had to stop myself from running to you. Most times it wasn't you. 'Least, not the one I was looking for. An' the one time it was…" Her voice trails off, unable to continue.

She can see his eyes now as he leans closer, the flickering light source illuminating his face. She feels as if he's searching her mind as their gazes lock, as if everything and anything she's thought or done over the years since they've been together has been unmasked before his heady stare.

"You didn't come to me," he says and there's a world of hurt in his tone.

"Wasn't right," she says, breaking away from the force of his gaze through willpower alone. "I… I don't know if… What's her name?" she asks, managing to get that single coherent question out, though the rest of her mind was lost in mindless babble.

"Her…" He seems confused for a moment, probably trying to place which 'her' she's talking about, she thinks. How long has it been for him? Linear time lies – that particular lesson has been drilled into her soul. What happened yesterday could be her present, her past, or her future. Time travellers know that there is no such thing as temporal linearity.

"Ah. Right. Month ago, wasn't it? Well, longer than that for me. Just needed a quick stop to top off the old TARDIS, really." He pauses and she can see a glimmer of grief in his eyes. "Her name was Martha."

She doesn't press. She thinks she doesn't have to. "I'm sorry." Whether she's apologising for not coming to him sooner or for whatever happened to Martha, she's not sure. All she knows is that he's hurting.

He says nothing, instead pulling her into his arms in an almost desperate embrace. She can feel the rhythmic beating of his hearts beneath his chest, the slight coolness of his body against hers. However, he remains silent and that seems to be the most telling of all. He's in agony, but it's quiet. So, so quiet.

She can give him comfort, at least. She'd do this for anyone. Though she doubts her own heart would break just a little for each tiny shudder of his body within her embrace for anyone other than him.

In this tiny room, isolated from the world outside, she can almost let herself believe that it'll be okay. That this is right where she's meant to be. But that's before the pragmatic side of her takes over, telling her that she's holding onto a fantasy.

She doesn't want to let him go.

And, when the time comes, she's not certain she'll be able to find the strength to do the right thing. Even if the right thing means telling him goodbye.

* * *

He's lived long enough to realise that there will always be regrets. That he didn't turn right, instead of left. That he didn't save a life when he should've. That someone innocent suffers because of his choices. That he didn't say what he should've said in the time allotted to him on a Norwegian beach.

He's missed this, missed her, for what seems to be forever. Fifty years is a long time in human reckoning, but merely a second to one as long-lived as he. He's had others travel with him, of course. He's never been by himself, though he's been alone. His ninth regeneration ruined him, he supposes.

He's not supposed to be so dependent on someone like her. And it's all coming back to him now. She's left everything she knows behind her to come back here. Said goodbye to her family forever, survived with UNIT and now… Oh, there's no question that she'll be coming with him.

He knows that's what she wants.

Or does he? This Rose Tyler has changed. Has grown up in ways that he's barely caught the merest glimpse of. She's avoided him a bit since he's got here. What if… Rasslion, what if she doesn't want to come with him?

"Rose," he begins, pulling away from her just enough to look into her eyes. The light leaves much to be desired, but he can see enough to know that he can so easily fall into her expression. There's solace there, with her arms around him. Solace from the burdens that have weighed down his shoulders throughout time. This is what it feels like, he knows.

The need to fall, though he's already fallen. So hard, so fast. In the instant that he thought she was gone - though, in some ways, it was just as hard to know that she lives in another universe where he can never touch her again – he wanted vengeance. He wanted more than that. He wanted destruction. To watch the Ice Warriors fall apart, to die, just as they did to him.

It scares him. He knows what he's capable of – who better? But this… No. This is why there are rules. Laws that he swore he would never break.

But he did. They are broken and shattered and he can't find it within himself to care. Not here. Not with her.

He still doesn't know if she wants to come with him again. She's formed a life for herself, a fantastic life. She's done everything that he hoped for her and more, but that doesn't stop him from being selfish. Can he truly ask her to give this up again? She doesn't have her family any more. Can he be a substitute for that? Should he be?

No, he's all she has left. Isn't he? She gave up a universe to come here. Gave up her family, her job, her life, to return to this one. She's got a life here, now. A life that doesn't include him.

Can he do that to her again? Pull her away from a stable life to one where death lurks around every corner? Should he?

He finds himself distracted by her smile, her tongue as it moistens her lips, everything. It'd be so easy to let himself drown in her. To give into the urge. To fall the rest of the way, to put into actions those words he's never said.

"Doctor?" she asks, causing him to force his attention away from her lips. "Are you all right?"

It's his turn to smile, a wide, happy smile that he thinks hasn't happened since, oh, since ever. "Now? I'm brilliant," he tells her and gives in.

It's the barest brush of his lips against hers. He quells the voice inside him that rails against this, protests opening his hearts to such hurt again, but he doesn't care. He could get addicted to this so, so…

The door swings open with a bang, bathing the room in harsh halogen lighting. They spring apart, a no-man's land of space between them, as he turns towards the doorway with every intention of yelling at whoever interrupted him.

"Doctor," Bambera says and he bites back a curse. "I need to talk to you."

He levels a steady glare at Bambera. "Course you do. Though, generally, I'm the one doing the talking and…" Rose thumps his arm gently and he gives her a wounded look. "Right. Being rude again. What do you want to talk about? I hear Manchester United's doing well this year. Or, oh, worried about whatever environmental impact the Ice Warriors'll have on the region? Don't worry. Whatever changes they've done'll die off in, oh, 'bout six hours or so. Everything'll be back to normal. Well, as near to it as one can get this close to Wales."

Bambera doesn't even blink. "Alone," she says pointedly and he feels Rose flinch beside him.

"Oh, you can say what you need to in front of Rose. After all, she is an employee," he says, giving the Brigadier his best smile.

"I'll go," Rose says and he gives her a startled look. "'S an order an' she is my CO. I'll see you later, yeah?"

He nods, disappointed. He can't help but notice her calling Bambera her 'CO'. She's truly been assimilated into UNIT, hasn't she? "Yeah." He's never been overly fond of authority. Especially when it comes to interrupting things that he considers to be important. Like talking to Rose.

She slips out of the room, leaving him alone with her commanding officer. Bambera closes the door firmly behind her, leaving them in the flickering light of the storeroom. "I want to know your intentions."

He's flummoxed. "What?"

"You're going to take away one of my finest employees, Doctor. I want certain guarantees."

"What?" He seems to be stuck repeating himself, but he can't help it. How did she-? What did she-? His thoughts tumble over each other in a futile attempt at coherence.

Bambera smiles. "There's one of two ways that this can go, Doctor. One, you leave here without Rose. Or, two, you both leave together with an understanding. Rose is still an employee of UNIT and a very valuable one. Should UNIT require her assistance – and, in turn, your own – you will bring her to us. Where I say, when I say. Am I understood?"

There're other choices, he knows. His favourite is, of course, the one where he takes Rose and swans off without making any sort of promise to Bambera. He doesn't do that, though. Not now. Not to Bambera. He likes her. She's a bit prickly, maybe. But she's always been that way. Nor can he do this to UNIT.

It helps, after all, to have at least one organisation on his favourite planet that isn't trying to kill him or capture him. Besides, the way he considers it, he gets the best of both worlds. Rose and the backing of UNIT. Win-win situation.

"I'll take door number two," he replies.

"Thought you would," Bambera says, nodding. "And, as a word of advice? I think she's been hurting for a long time, Doctor. Don't add to it." With those words, she turns and leaves him alone in the room with only a flickering light bulb and his thoughts for company.

* * *

She hugs herself against the chill – though it's warmer than it was - as she leans against one of the walls in the control room. It doesn't take a genius to know what Bambera's talking to him about. Planning out her future. Deciding where she's going. Perhaps warning him to walk away.

Thing is, she can't say that that isn't the best choice of all. For him (or her) to walk away. She can learn (never) to forget him. To forget (impossible) what it means to be with him, to save lives. She can still save the world, after all, as she's been doing. Just one world, one time. That can be enough of a fantastic life for her, can't it?

She hates this. Hates second guessing herself. Hates realising that the hardest thing about being an adult is making the right choice not just for herself, but for him as well. She can't be certain that he really wants her to come with him for the right reasons. That that kiss wasn't because of anything more than pity or just her being alive. Not because he's in lo…

No. She won't think about it. It'll hurt less when the inevitable comes to pass. At least, that's what she tells herself.

Bambera walks out of the storage room alone and spares her a long, indecipherable look before she goes to talk to Benton. The colonel is being treated for his injuries now, still fending off the increasingly agitated comments from the plant manager.

She should probably join them. Ask for orders, perhaps, or even go and collect what samples of Martian life remain and get them back to the Cardiff HQ for analysis. She's torn. She wants to talk to him again. Wants to see him again.

He's addictive, she realises. One touch, one sight, one (god help her) kiss isn't enough. Can never be enough. Any life that she leads now won't be the same because he knows she's alive. Knows she's here. She could've survived knowing that some day she'd find him again.

Now that some day has arrived, she thinks that it might've been better had it remained the metaphorical _some day_. She wouldn't be so conflicted then.

The Doctor emerges from the room with a thoughtful look on his face. She supposes he'll go talk to Benton now, or one of the others. Instead, he searches the room before finally settling his gaze upon her. A broad, happy smile crosses his face as he walks towards her and for a heart-stopping moment she wonders if he's going to repeat his actions from before. Kiss her again, despite the various witnesses, despite it being in front of her CO.

Instead, he stops in front of her and holds out his hand. "Come with me?" he asks and she thinks back to the last time she heard him ask this, in his last body, in the alternate Torchwood.

She said yes then. She doesn't think she can say yes now. Not without knowing the truth. However, the Doctor isn't one to share his reasons. He merely does what he thinks he has to and damns the consequences. She has responsibilities now. She can't shirk them. And he… he can't be asking for the right reasons. Can't be.

"Oh, and if you're worried about your job, that's been sorted. We're, well, I suppose you'd call it on retainer. If Bambera wants us, she'll call. Oooh, that's it. Who ya gonna call? Us! The original time and space travelling fighters of crime. The… Wait, no, that doesn't sound right. And dynamic duo is already taken. Drat. And I was on a roll," he says with a pout, shuffling his feet.

Her earlier doubts fade as anger fills her, sudden and brilliant. "You sorted it? You fixed my job? Put us on retainer? Without _asking_ me?"

He's wide-eyed with shock as he stares at her. "Thought that… Well, really it was Bambera who sorted it, but… Don't you _want_ to come with me?"

"Yes. No. Damnit, that's not the point. You sorted it without asking me. Just assumed." She folds her arms in front of herself in a defensive posture.

"Rose, I thought you wanted to come with me," he says softly and she can hear the hurt in his tone.

She tells herself that the stinging at the corners of her eyes isn't tears, though she knows she's lying. "Not if… Bollocks, I can't do this."

"Can't do what?"

"Can't pretend that you're not asking me to come with you because you feel sorry for me. Or because you're lonely 'cause your last companion's gone. Not because you…" She can't talk now, not through the lump in her throat.

"Because I-?" he prompts, his voice gentle as he looks at her. Where's his anger? His betrayal? His hurt? Oh, yes, some of that's there, but there's more than that. She can hear it in his voice, but she doesn't dare let herself believe.

"-love me," she says in a whisper so low that she barely hears it herself.

And she closes her eyes and braces herself for the inevitable.

_To be concluded..._


	10. Chapter 10: Living

**Chapter 10: Living**

_"And I suppose… if it's one last chance to say it…" He paused a moment, eyes locked with hers, his hearts breaking. "Rose Tyler…"_

_Time was up. It had always been a cruel mistress, but now he cursed the loss of seconds, of minutes, of hours, of days, months and years. The loss of her was a gaping wound, adding to the already yawning loss of Gallifrey._

_He left one of his hearts behind, held by Rose Tyler, on a beach in an alternate Norway. And he damned his inability to say the words. To say the one thing that would possibly help. He always had regrets. This, however, was the greatest of them all…_

His breath catches in his throat at her words. She stands before him, eyes closed against what he assumes she supposes will be his rejection. It makes him wonder what's happened to her in the two-odd years since she's last seen him. Once upon a time, she never would've doubted him. Never would've doubted that he's telling her anything but the truth. That he loves her. Perhaps Bambera's right. Perhaps she is hurting.

And he can't help but wonder if it's because of him. Because of their separation and those far too short minutes on a Norwegian beach. How is he supposed to act? What is he supposed to say? He's always been a man of action, rather than words. Even though he talks a great deal, he rarely says anything of import.

She doesn't know how he feels. He suspects that that means he's been far more successful in hiding his emotions than he thought.

"Rose," he says softly, brushing his hand against her cheek. "Some things are best said in private. Not to mention where no-one can interrupt. Come with me? I know the old girl would love to see you again."

She opens her eyes and looks at him carefully, as if she's weighing his words. "All right," she says and, after getting permission from the Brigadier, he escorts her out of the room. He tells himself that he doesn't feel Bambera's steely gaze upon him as he goes.

They're silent as they walk, carefully avoiding medical personnel and fallen debris. Part of him wants to fill that silence with words, but he feels that even that might be too much for her. He can only hope that the combination of the TARDIS and what he needs to say will be enough to convince her.

If not, well, at least she'll only be a short hop away with the TARDIS. That can be enough, right? Or so he tells himself.

Some minutes later, it's Rose that breaks the silence as he's about to open the last door between them and his ship. "You hid the TARDIS in a broom cupboard?" she asks, sounding as if she's trying not to laugh.

He shrugs, though he can't fight the grin that crosses his face. "Best place to park. Out of the way, scenic view, all the comforts of home. Provided your home is in a broom cupboard. And you like the smell of cleaning fluid. Which I don't. Does a terrible number on my allergies," he says and gives a comic sneeze.

"You're full of it," she says and there's the laughter.

"Who? Me?" he asks, wide-eyed as he ushers her inside first one door and then the double doors to the TARDIS.

The ship's hum deepens in welcome as he closes the doors behind them. When he turns, he sees that Rose has already crossed the room and is gently touching one of the struts. "Hello, old girl," she says softly and the ship's hum changes in pitch.

"She's missed you, you know," he says, leaning against the doors.

"I've missed her," she replies, smiling as she looks around the room. "It hasn't changed."

_It has_, he wants to tell her. _So very much_. However, he keeps his tongue as he lets her spend a few seconds getting reacquainted.

"So what was it you wanted to say?" she asks, turning towards him, keeping one hand on the strut.

Now that he has her full attention, he finds himself fumbling for the words. Anything would do, really, but he feels as if he's lost. How can he convince her to stay? Even if all she wants to do is go?

Rassilon, it never used to be this difficult.

"You thought I pitied you," he finally says, looking intently at her and willing her to believe his words. "I don't pity you. Anything but that. You managed to find your way back to this universe. You've managed to survive – if anything, it's far more than that. You've built yourself a life after leaving your family behind. And that's brilliant. Absolutely brilliant."

She ducks her head slightly, but he can see a flush colour her cheeks. She opens her eyes, but keeps her attention on the lapel of his jacket. "Then why?"

"Why do I want you to come with me?" he asks.

She nods, keeping silent.

He smiles gently. "Fun fairs! It's just like fun fairs. You know, going to a fun fair, riding the rides, seeing the sights and eating as much candy floss as you can possibly eat without getting sick. Well, maybe not so much the last bit. Anyway, where was I?" He pauses, brow furrowed as he considers what he was saying. "Ah, yes, fun fairs. That's the universe, Rose. One great big, giant fun fair with so much to see and do. So much to show. And you know what the best thing is about fun fairs?"

She looks at him, finally meeting his gaze. "What?"

"They're so much better with two. You see, a very wise person once told me that travelling the universe is better with two. And she was absolutely, magnificently right," he tells her with a wide grin.

"Oh," she says dully. "So that's it. You jus' want me to come because I'm here."

Undaunted, he continues, "Thing is, it has to be the right two. And you know what?" He holds out his hand to her, palms up. "It always was the right two with us."

She's hesitant, but he's patient, waiting for her to make the first move. When her fingers finally slide over his, he gently wraps his hand around hers. "See? Perfect fit. Always was, wasn't it?"

Rose smiles. "Yeah," she agrees. "How long's it been for you? I mean, since I travelled with you."

His expression sobers slightly. Something tells him that telling her decades isn't what she truly wants to hear. He's learning now, after all these years, how many things can be hidden behind a question. Words can lie. It's what's behind them that counts.

"Oh, I could tell you what it's been like for me since I lost you. Go into how every time I turn a corner in the TARDIS I expect to see you. Or how the scent of freesias makes me think of you. That I can never put my coat on properly because you're the only one who held it for me. Or maybe that I can't go anywhere near the Powell Estates any more because... well, just because. Or that I can't help smiling any time anyone says 'so impressive'. Yeah, I could tell you any of that and more. But that's not what really matters. All that _really_ matters is that nothing's ever fit the same way as this." He holds up their hands and tugs her back into his arms for another hug.

He can't seem to stop himself from touching her. This has always been a particularly tactile regeneration, but this is more than that. He supposes it's because he wants to convince himself that she's really here. Really back. And that, when he closes his eyes and opens them again, he won't find that this has really just been a dream.

He doesn't think he could handle that any better than he has before, which is to say not at all.

"Now that I've got you back, Rose Tyler, I don't want to let you go," he tells her, whispering the words into her hair.

* * *

She sighs against him, letting her head rest against his chest and listening to the comforting sound of his heartsbeats. Her earlier doubts seem so nebulous now, so stupid and childish. She knows that she'll never hear him say the words 'I love you', but that's okay.

She knows and that's enough for her.

Rose tightens her embrace, whispering her promise against his chest. "You won't have to."

She thinks she feels him press a kiss against her hair just before he pulls away from the embrace just enough to look her in the eyes. She finds, for the first time since she's ever known him, that his expression is open and his gaze even more so.

She can read every emotion as they cross his face, the way his eyes glance downwards, at her lips, and the way he slowly returns his attention to her eyes. Giving her every chance to say no, to back away, to do anything but this, he slowly leans forward and presses his lips against hers.

His lips taste salty, she thinks, and she realises that that is because of tears. Hers. His. It doesn't matter as their mouths gently move against each other, a gesture of affection and, yes, of love that is as timeless as he.

When the kiss finally breaks, they're both breathless.

"Thank you," he tells her and she can hear everything that he can't say in those two words.

Much as she wishes that she could capture this moment for eternity, she knows that it can't last. Reality is always bound to intrude, the same with her responsibilities. Lifting a hand to rest it against his cheek – it's so strange to realise that she's truly free to do this now, to touch him, to kiss him, to express her affection in the best ways possible. They were always tactile, yes. Hugs, brief kisses against foreheads, holding hands.

This, however, is so much more than that. She knows as well as he that this is just the first step. A new beginning.

"You're welcome," she says, acknowledging his words spoken and unspoken. They share a smile and a comfortable silence for a few minutes, each embroiled in their own thoughts.

She realises that this won't be easy. Can't be easy, really. She's not going into this, returning to him, blinded. She knows what she's in for, what she's up against. She can't expect to be on a fixed schedule, be able to pay the bills on her flat or go to work every day. She could arrive the day before or a week ahead or twelve months ago. There are no guarantees in this life she's choosing and she has to acknowledge that.

There's no running into the TARDIS without looking back for her. Not anymore. That girl's grown up.

She breaks the silence by giving voice to her thoughts. "I need to go back. I can't jus' swan off like I could before, even if you've sorted it with the Brigadier. I've got to give notice for my flat an'…"

He curbs her words by pressing a finger against her lips. "We've got all the time in the world."

She catches his fingers with the hand that had rested against his cheek, pulling them away from her lips. "Sooner it's done, sooner we can leave."

The Doctor looks at her for a long moment before he nods. "Right, then. Cardiff it is. Could probably do with another top-up, anyway."

Releasing her, though she can tell he's reluctant to do so, he hurries to the centre console, flipping switches and twisting knobs. However, before they dematerialise, he pauses. "Well?" he asks, gesturing towards the controls.

She blinks at him, confused. What could he-? Oh. A wide smile crosses her face as she moves to join him. It seems like it's been forever since she's last done this, but the memories come flooding back. The barest brush of a finger there. Touching a button here. A twist of that knob. And a pull of that lever.

The sound of the time rotor's rhythmic pulse fills the room and she smiles, relieved.

"A bit like riding a bike, isn't it?" he asks from just behind her, stepping forward to rest a hand on her shoulder. "Well, a very advanced bike that's nothing like a bike in that it travels through time and space and doesn't have wheels. But, really, just like riding a bike."

She laughs, hard. She finds that she can't remember the last time she laughed like this and decides that she doesn't care. This is what happiness is like. Despite everything that's happened to her. Despite her family being stuck on the other side of the Void and UNIT and everything else. This is happiness. She's happy. Really and truly happy.

"Seriously, you're full of it," she says once she manages to regain control of her laughter, her muscles aching.

"No, I'm not," he replies, using his hand to turn her to face him. "Well, maybe a bit. –Ish. But not really. You try coming up with analogies that fit twenty-first century thinking with Gallifreyan technology."

Gallifreyan. She sobers suddenly, trying to place that word. She's never heard it before, but it sounds familiar. Lyrical, somehow. As if she's heard it in a song. She thinks she understands the context, though. He's given her something that he hasn't before. Another insight into who he is. "Gallifreyan?" she asks, already knowing the answer.

"Yeah," he replies with a nod. "Gallifrey is my homeworld. Well, was." He swallows after the last word and she can see a shadow of the sorrow that he's never truly forgotten.

"'S a lovely name," she says, reaching out to grab his hand.

"Yes. It is," he agrees. "I'll tell you about it some time, if you like."

"I'd like that." She knows that he isn't ready to talk about his homeworld, not just yet, but this is a step that she doubts he would've taken before they were separated. He's reaching out to her, offering her far more than he ever has before.

And that is, to borrow his previous self's favourite phrase, fantastic.

She moves closer to him, leaning against him as they watch the slow movements of the rotor. It doesn't take long to arrive back in Cardiff, but it's long enough to make her wonder about those that followed her. About Martha. About what's happened to him since she last saw him.

"Doctor," she begins and she can feel that she has his complete attention. "What happened to Martha?"

His breath catches in his throat and she regrets ever asking the question. "She found a cause worth dying for," he says softly. "A planet, some ten thousand light-years and a dozen centuries from now. There was this rebellion and… She didn't make it."

"Oh, god," she says, wrapping her arms around him in a tight embrace. "I'm so sorry. I shouldn't've asked…"

"It was a long time ago," he tells her, but something in his voice tells her that he's lying. If anything, it was recent. So very recent. He holds her and she can feel tiny tremors move through him, though he doesn't make a sound.

"I'm sorry," she repeats her earlier words, though they sound hollow. Even so, the sentiment behind them is anything but. She didn't know, yes. But how can that excuse her from causing him so much pain?

He doesn't answer her in words, instead giving her another squeeze. When he releases her moments later, she finds it almost impossible to see that he's upset. It's only because she knows him that she can see the signs. She feels horrible for even mentioning it.

"You didn't know," he says, smiling faintly at her. Before he can say anything else, the pulse of the time rotor increases, signifying that they are materialising.

"Saved by the bell," she whispers and it's only when he shoots her a mixed glance of pain and amusement that she realises what she's said.

Once the ship stopped, she headed for the doors, almost surprised when she realises that the Doctor is following her. "You're coming with me?" she asks, surprised.

"I told you," he says, grabbing her hand tightly within his own. "I'm not letting you out of my sight."

She searches his eyes and what she finds there sends a shiver down her spine. He's still afraid, as she suspects he always will be, that she'll leave him. That this isn't what she wants. That she doesn't want to be with him. "It'll be at least a week," she replies, warning him as to what he's up against. "Sorting the flat, my job, my things…"

"I've faced megalomaniacs, Slitheen, Daleks, Cybermen, villains of all shapes and sizes. Including, I might add, a villainous flower. Don't look at me like that, it's true. And it looked like a flower too, only it was plotting to take over… Right. As I was saying. I'm coming. Got it?"

A warm smile crosses her face and she gives into the urge to kiss him. It's soft, a gentle pressure of lips against lips, though even the smallest of kisses has a strong effect on her. Only because it's him. It's her. And she's free to do this now.

"That's good," she says as she pulls away only enough to give her space to talk. "'Cause I don't intend to let you out of my sight either."

Then she withdraws, reaching for his hand as she heads back for the doors, feeling a thrill of pleasure course through her.

She could only hope that this won't take too long. Being this close to him again. Being able to travel the universe again…

She doesn't think it's any wonder that her feet are starting to itch.

* * *

Never underestimate the power of red-tape, he thinks. Well, any type of tape, really. Though he thinks that mauve would be a far more apt colour than anything else. While Bambera did her best to smooth the way for Rose's departure, some things couldn't be rushed. Even doing his best impression of an impatient Time Lord – which wasn't much of an impression when it was the truth – had little effect.

Instead of one week, it stretched into two. Now, finally, he's managed to pry her away from the demands of UNIT and sorting out her flat.

She sighs softly, leaning against him as they walk hand-in-hand towards the TARDIS. "Thought that'd never end."

He smiles slightly and remains silent, letting the pleasure of simply existing again fill him. There was a time, not so long ago, that he thought he was doomed. The Lonely God fated to wander Eternity alone.

Good thing that Fate's looking in the opposite direction. "So, Rose Tyler, now that you're free of your life of work, chips, and the telly, what would you like to do first?"

She slows to a stop a few feet from the TARDIS, forcing him to follow her lead. Smiling up at him, he can see a thousand different promises in her eyes. Catching his other hand in her own, her smile deepens. "What do I want to do first?" she asks.

He nods, finding himself lost in her eyes.

"I want to go home," she says and he blinks, confused.

"Home?"

She nods, gesturing with their joined hands to a point just behind him. "The TARDIS," she tells him, letting just the tip of her tongue touch the back of her teeth as she grins.

An echoing grin tugs the corners of his lips upwards as he nods. "Yeah," he says, brushing a thumb over one of her hands, not taking his eyes off her. "Let's go home."

It's only later, after the TARDIS is safely in the Vortex and Rose has gone to fetch tea, that he realises something. For the longest time, he thought the word 'home' didn't apply to anything. It isn't Gallifrey. It isn't even the TARDIS.

No. Rose isn't the only one who's come home.

He looks up as she comes back into the control room, carrying two steaming mugs, and grins.

So has he.

* * *

In the shadows, hidden from all but the most trained of watchers, the man known as Jack Harkness watches the TARDIS dematerialise. Two weeks ago, he wouldn't've cared what might happen. He would've marched out from his hiding place, punched the Doctor (probably after kissing him within inches of his multiple lives) and demanded that he be fixed. Demand everything that he wanted and more.

Now he stays hidden. This isn't for the Doctor. No, he's still too angry, too broken for that. This is for Rose. For what he did. An atonement. A bid for absolution.

He doesn't like what he did, but he knows why he did it much as he knows why she left. This is the only forgiveness he can extend to or expect for himself. There'll be other times. Other places.

He'll find them again.

For now, let this be their reunion. The Doctor and Rose, together again.

He'll just continue to wait in the shadows until the time is right.

Good things come to those who wait, he knows.

As always, it's only a matter of time.

**THE END**


End file.
